Sarah Pritchard

January 6, 2011
Philosophy 12
Aquinas Response Paper

“Faith and hope do imply a certain imperfection, for faith is about things which are not seen and
hope is about things which are not yet had.”
- St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, Article III.

The question that Aquinas raises in the third article of Summa Theologiae is if faith, hope

and charity are appropriately proposed as theological virtues. In the second objection, Aquinas

says that the theological virtues are more perfect than the intellectual and moral virtues.

However, faith is imperfect knowledge, so it is something less than a virtue. This quote is the

thesis of Aquinas’ response to this objection. Because you cannot see something that you have

faith in, it is somehow imperfect because it lacks the ability to 100% know of its existence. And

because we do not yet have something that we are hoping for, it is somehow imperfect because

there is a chance that it may not be attained. The question that must then be contemplated is

whether this “imperfection” puts faith and hope on a level above or below that of virtue.

“Faith and hope do imply a certain imperfection” for exactly the reasons I stated before.

Faith is what we have when we believe in something that we can never fully know to exist. The

imperfection comes from the fact that, theoretically, there is always a chance that we are wrong

and that that thing really does not exist. Hope is what we have when we want something and are

optimistic about attaining it. The imperfection in this comes from the uncertainty of whether or

not we will actually attain what we want – hope is a wonderful thing to have, but it ultimately

does not control the outcome of a situation.

 When Aquinas says that “faith is about things which are not seen,” what he means is that

faith allows us to believe in the existence of that which we cannot see. We use our reason to

decide when we know enough about something to believe in it without seeing it. For example,

having studied Christianity in depth for years, many students at Montrose have decided that they

have been provided with enough reasons to affirm their belief in God.

When Aquinas says that “hope is about things which are not yet had,” what he means is

that hope allows us to foresee a beneficial outcome of a situation in the future. Just as we use

reason to build our faith, we use reason to build hope as well. For example, I hope that I will

attend my top-choice school next year. I have used reason to justify this hope; I have been

accepted, they have given me a scholarship, and I should be able to get some decent financial

aid.

Faith and hope are very much intertwined and both illuminate the relationship between

virtue and reason. Their supposed “imperfection,” however, comes from uncertainty. One can

have very strong faith in something, but they can never say that our perfectly sure of its

existance. They can be very, very close, but it is impossible to know for certain. One can also

hope for something very strongly, but they can never say that are perfectly sure that it will

happen. They can be nearly 100% certain, but they can never be completely sure. This

uncertainty is partly what has caused me to struggle with faith so strongly and to ultimately give

it up. There are a multitude of other, more important reasons, but uncertainty undoubtedly

contributed to my decisions concerning faith. On the flip side, one can use this uncertainty to

plead the opposing case – while I do not believe that God exists, I can never be completely sure

that He doesn’t, and that is an imperfection in my lack of faith. While I have good reasons to

justify my hope that I will attend the University of Hartford next year, I cannot be completely
certain that I will. This imperfection is what has caused many to say that faith and hope are

below virtues; they are imperfect, so how can they be virtuous? However, I would make the

point that this “imperfection” puts them above virtue because in order to have faith and to have

hope, you need to have virtue – faith and hope presuppose virtue because they recognize it,

include it, and go beyond it because they allow belief without knowing.