Download or read book Sacrifice in the Natural Law According to St. Thomas Aquinas written by Thomas Aquinas Pickett and published by . This book was released on 2017 with total page 166 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This thesis investigates why St. Thomas Aquinas includes sacrifice among acts prescribed by the natural law. St. Thomas grounds the natural law in inclinations of human nature that are teleologically ordered to perfection. These human inclinations reflect the overall movement of creatures to their perfection by divine providence. Since human perfection pertains to attaining God, there is a natural inclination directing humans to order their lives to God. The virtue that perfects this inclination is the virtue of religion, which is a potential part of the virtue of justice. In St. Thomas's thought, the act of sacrifice is a particular act of the virtue of religion that most perfectly expresses this act of right order to God. Sacrifice, as an act of the virtue of religion, arising from the inclination to right relationship with God, is therefore a part of the natural law. The natural inclination to sacrifice, however, stands in need of determination from custom or law. This presentation of the natural law and of religious acts differs greatly from the one offered by proponents of the New Natural Law Theory, which we use as a foil to clarify St. Thomas's position. This thesis claims that St. Thomas's account of sacrifice in the natural law may benefit interreligious dialogue, liturgical studies, and efforts of evangelization.