Photos: St. Thomas Day 2019

On Monday members of the Thomas Aquinas College community celebrated the feast of St. Thomas Aquinas with a fitting combination of prayer, scholarship, and fun.

For early risers, the day began with the 7:15 a.m. Mass in Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity Chapel, offered in the extraordinary form by the College’s head chaplain, Rev. Paul Raftery, O.P. “In his studies, St. Thomas was pursuing, in fact, love more than knowledge,” said Fr. Paul in his homily. “And above all he recommends the Scriptures to us to stir up our love. The more we read them, the stronger that love becomes. The more we give ourselves over to meditating on the mysteries of Christ, the more we can stir the love of God into flame.”

For the community Mass at 9:00 a.m., the College was blessed to have a guest celebrant, the Most Rev. Daniel E. Flores, Bishop of Brownsville, Texas. In his homily His Excellency likewise employed the language of “stirring,” noting that “our salvation depends on our ability to be stirred and respond to Him.” In this regard, he observed, St. Thomas is the “exemplary teacher” because “his eyes are always focused on Christ.”

That afternoon students and members of the faculty gathered in the St. Cecilia Lecture and Concert Hall, where Bishop Flores served as the year’s St. Thomas Day lecturer. “Thomas is a theological witness to a truth of Catholic faith, namely that after the full revelation of Christ’s historical appearance, the Church has access to the aim of history,” His Excellency said. “Hence, all the faithful now have the capacity by spiritual instinct and knowledge of the Gospel to see themselves figured in Christ.” The rapt audience responded with a rare standing ovation, after which he answered questions from students and tutors alike.

After dinner, the day culminated with a favorite campus tradition, Trivial and Quadrivial Pursuits, a campus-wide quiz show famous for its extravagant costumes and over-the-top displays of creative gamesmanship. Three teams, each drawn from members of all four classes, vied in a competition to answer questions taken from the College’s classical curriculum, with a panel of tutors posing the questions.

Per custom, each team chose a theme and appropriate costumes. The Rhetoricians dressed in costumes recalling ancient Israel, with their captain, Benjamin Trull (’19) playing the role of King Solomon. Captained by Jose Guardiolo (’19), the Grammarians dressed up as their favorite tutors — and tutor children who are Thomas Aquinas College students. Meanwhile, the Grammarians, led by captain, Thomas Keller (’19), donned the garb of the weekend hikers who often pass the College’s California campus on their way to the Los Padres National Forest.

At the end of the competition, this year’s winners — the Rhetoricians, in a landslide — celebrated with the faculty at a party in the Dumb Ox Café.