Sixteenth-Century Reception of Aquinas by the Council of Trent and Its Main Authors
The sixteenth-century Council of Trent occupies a central place in Catholic life. The disciplinary reforms and theological clarifications made by the college of bishops under the authority of the pope still shape Catholic teaching. Because of the development of the Thomist Commentatorial Tradition by the middle of the sixteenth century, Aquinas greatly influenced the thinking of the council’s leading participants. The Summa theologiae and, especially, its commentary by Thomas de Vio, Cardinal Cajetan (d. 1534), who had held exchanges with Luther, helped to resolve many of the council’s most pressing agenda items. The Council of Trent aimed to initiate reforms that served the wellbeing of the Catholic Church. Toward this end, the articulation that Aquinas introduces into Catholic theology enabled the Council to distinguish authentic Catholic teaching from some of the distortions that appeared around the time of the Protestant Reform.