Introduction

This lecture was given on July 17, 2022 at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, D.C. for the Fourth Annual Thomistic Philosophy and Natural Science Symposium: Complexity, Simplicity and Emergence. For more information on upcoming events, please visit our website at www.thomisticinstitute.org. About the speaker: Fr. Thomas Joseph White completed his bachelor’s in religious studies from Brown University (1993) and his Master’s (1995) and Doctorate (2002) in Theology at Oxford University. He entered the Order of Preachers in 2003. He completed his licentiate in Sacred Theology (2007) at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, D.C. He professed final vows in 2007 and was ordained a priest in 2008. His research and teaching concentrate on Thomistic metaphysics, Christology and Roman Catholic-Reformed ecumenical dialogue. He was appointed an ordinary member of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas in 2011. White taught at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, D.C from 2008-2018, and was the founder and Director of the Washington DC Thomistic Institute from 2009 until his departure for Rome in 2018. In 2015 White became co-editor of Nova et Vetera Journal, an American Catholic Theological journal. In 2018 he was assigned to teach at the Angelicum and function as the Director of the Angelicum Thomistic Institute. In June 2021, he was appointed rector of the Angelicum in Rome, and in June 2022 White was appointed president of the Academy of Catholic Theology, one of the principal societies of academic Catholic theology in the United States.