Thomas Aquinas on Grace as a Mysterious Kind of Creature

Abstract

Although the question of whether, in the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas, the grace of justification or divinization is “created” or “uncreated” has received considerable attention in late 20and early 21century scholarship, many of the questions and arguments proposed by those in favor of grace being uncreated have gone unanswered. Among these ancillary questions and arguments are those concerning the subject of grace for Aquinas, Aquinas’s classification of grace within the Aristotelian categories, and the reason for the mystery and unconsciousness of grace. These questions appear unrelated, but, as will be seen in this paper, they are each logically connected to each other and to the overall thesis that sanctifying grace is created, not uncreated. This paper aims to make Aquinas’s thesis that grace is created more palatable to objectors by addressing each of these ancillary questions.