Conforming to Right Reason

Ryan J. Brady holds a doctorate in Moral Theology from Ave Maria University and teaches at Thomas Aquinas College in Santa Paula, California, where he resides with his wife Rebecca and three children. Previously, he served as the Chair of the Philosophy and Theology departments at St. John Vianney College Seminary. His articles have appeared in Nova et Vetera and Angelicum. He has also translated several works of St. Thomas Aquinas as part of the Aquinas Institute's Opera Omnia series.

Professor Brady has written an extremely impressive work that, in an exhaustive and precise manner, examines areas of Thomas Aquinas's thought that are of fundamental importance for contemporary ethics and moral theology. In a charitable but forthright manner he demonstrates that certain major figures in these fields have offered misreadings of Thomas as a basis for their own theories." - Kevin L. Flannery, S.J. Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome"In a fine display of Thomistic scholarship, Ryan Brady's Conforming to Right Reason sets forth the ends of the moral virtues and their importance for our lives, showing how natural reason and prudence as the 'charioteer' of the virtues direct our appetites and desires to virtuous ends. He guides us through from Aquinas's early to his late works on this question, helps to resolve long-standing puzzles, and shows commendable mastery both of the recent scholarship and the historic commentators in the Thomist tradition. Moreover, as a professional translator of Thomistic works from the Latin, his fluency in Aquinas's language and thought is simply outstanding. In an era where nonsense in the mind continually reinforces corruption in the appetites, work like Brady's is exactly what we need." - David Elliot The Catholic University of America"In this book, Ryan Brady accomplishes an impressive feat. He decisively contributes—offering a compelling solution—to a long-standing debate among interpreters of Aquinas with respect to the role of reason and the will in the judgments of conscience and prudence. Moreover, after decades of scholarly and pastoral confusion about conscience and morality, Brady's analysis of Aquinas is worth reading by anyone interested in thinking clearly about such matters. Thoughtfully engaging with many interlocutors from the past and the present, Brady defends the priority of intellectual judgement in pursuit of happiness and right action. Truth matters for the moral life!" - Michael A. Dauphinais Ave Maria University"All too forgotten in discussions concerning knowledge of first moral principles, synderesis, the profound root of conscience, deserves a much more central place in scholastic discussions of moral epistemology. This is particularly true concerning our knowledge of the natural law, the content of which ramifies through all the various acquired moral virtues. If reflection on first principles is truly an office of wisdom, then reflection on our epistemological capacities for knowing such principles is also part of such sapiential meditation. Given that a small error in principles will lead to immense woe in later discussions and debates, assiduous attention should be paid to Dr. Brady's analysis in this text so that future debates concerning virtue ethics, moral epistemology, and human knowledge of the natural law might focus more on this important intellectual habitus, synderesis, without which no moral knowledge would ever be articulated by any human mind. No sound moral epistemology, whether in the order of nature or in that of the Christian life of grace, can fail to take into account the noetic phenomenon associated with our grasping of moral truths by way of synderesis. This text is to be highly recommended, and it is my hope that it helps to reorient contemporary debates around the truly central principles that dominate the whole of the various questions connected with the matters covered in this admirable volume." - Matthew K. Minerd Byzantine Catholic Seminary of Ss. Cyril and Methodius