Does God Speak Through Signs? (Aquinas 101)

Is it reasonable to believe in God because of supernatural signs? Catholicism says yes: many signs confirm that God himself has revealed the mysteries of faith spelled out in the articles of the Creed. St. Thomas Aquinas says it belongs to theology to offer a narrative of those confirmatory signs. In this video, Fr. James Brent reviews the illative sense, motives of credibility, and such confirmatory signs, or evidences, for the faith.

Does God Speak through Signs? (Aquinas 101) - Fr. James Brent, O.P.

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This video was made possible through the support of grant #61944 from the John Templeton Foundation. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the John Templeton Foundation.

[johnwake]

It is such a delight to have these intellectually rich discussions of the problems of the faith!

[tgrt]

Bishop Barron did a wonderful talk on at Oxford about the illative sense. I recommend it to any of you interested in this concept

[jjcm]

Nice concept for tying together visible signs. I think I ll remember that. It helps that it has a long history itself. Thanks.

[siennamargeaux]

I am happy and grateful that this channel exists.

[phild]

What do you mean by “they at least ‘thought’ they experienced the risen Jesus”? Are you saying that the resurrection is reducible to a thought? I was under the firm teaching that He absolutely rose from the dead and many people actually saw Him.

[tomdooley]

No prejudice against the supernatural, no prejudice for natural law.
That would be me., it would explain why I have no problem with believing a few things, but then I deeply know natural law isn't all there is.

[scottknapp]

When all “signs” are evaluated individually or cumulatively, a leap of faith is still required to reach God. Jesus knew this, which is why He bristled at the disciples’ need to see signs and wonders. Indeed, He knew signs are antithetical to faith. Faith and signs are independent. They might be correlated. But signs, and everything else that can be revealed to the senses, aren’t causal for faith. There is a gulf between reason (with which signs are evaluated) and faith that can only be crossed by human free agency. Said another way, you have to choose to believe.

[davonbenson]

Lol, faith literally goes hand in hand with knowledge. Hoping that scientific measurements will lead to a positive result is faith.

[gottschalkregnarts]

Yeah, thats where I take the Augustinian perspective. Faith is unreasonable to the carnal mind. That is also the case Paul is making in the first three chapter of 1 Corinthians.

I recommend the reading of Augustine Confessions, Book 6 chapter 5. Augustine says that faith without reason, or at least reason outside of faith, was the common practice in the church. The early church also taught these principles and I think we should abide to those teachings.

[drewm]

Just remember that the Orthodox Church has numerous ecclesiastical miracles as well, and Craig Keener documented many miracles for Protestants in his 2 volume work on Miracles. Indian yogis have also produced miracles too. So you can be sad that miracles don't prove dogma, or happy that the ubiquity of miracles shows that atheism is false.

[josephahearn]

It seems to me that the illative sense is kind of like a combination of induction (going from particulars to universals) and intuition. Am I on the right track?

[TroglodyteDiner]

Paul's martyrdom belongs to folklore. His last mention in canonical scripture, the last chapter or Acts, finds him living comfortably in Rome, freely teaching the Gospel to all who visited. It's quite likely both Peter and Paul simply died of old age. They were certainly getting up there! Does not being martyrs tarnish their sainthood?

[brendangolledge]

I am not prejudiced against the reality of the supernatural. I am prejudiced against taking any second-hand accounts on faith. I have been lied to about many important things in my life and I'm not going to trust anything anyone says that I can't verify for myself.

[boku]

This logic was very easy to follow but first one must educate himself about the matter so he knows how compilation of these reasons led us to this conclusion.
Because to outsider without it, it seem irational what we do and think and we are partially to blame for this but also the the outsiders because they chose the easier rout of dismissing us and remaining ignorant without putting effort into trying to understand

[markballantyne]

It's such stupid question only someone with no faith would ask it

[michaelanderson]

"...thus giving us a sense of god speaking to us through the prophets and apostles."

A very poor substitute for god actually speaking to us himself directly. Wonder why?

[adelephilomenadonata]

You need to see God. Here it is: الله