750th Anniversary of the Death of Thomas Aquinas

At the centre, Saint Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) in the habit of the Dominican Order, holding a volume of his major work, the 'Summa Theologica', in his left hand and a quill in the other. A sun shines on his chest, a symbol of his great wisdom. Among the many titles he received, 'DOCTOR ANGELICUS' is visible along the lower edge. To the left, a lily — a symbol of chastity — and the Church of Saint Thomas in Roccasecca, the first religious building in the world dedicated to St Thomas, who was canonised by Pope John XXII on 18 July 1323. The issuing state 'CITTA' DEL VATICANO' appears along the upper edge beside the portrait, with the years '1274' and '2024' and the initials of the designer and engraver on either side.

For the Vatican, Thomas Aquinas is no minor historical figure but a foundation. The Dominican from Roccasecca in southern Italy, born around 1225, is still regarded today as the most systematic thinker the Roman Catholic Church has produced. His life's work was to unite Aristotelian thought with Christian faith — an intellectual achievement unprecedented in 13th-century scholasticism that shaped the Church's theology well into the 20th century. In 1879, Pope Leo XIII declared his philosophy the official foundation of Catholic teaching in the encyclical Aeterni Patris. Aquinas died in 1274 on his way to the Second Council of Lyon; he was canonized in 1323 and named a Doctor of the Church in 1567.

His major work, the "Summa Theologica," is a systematic compendium of Christian theology in three parts comprising several thousand articles. In it, Thomas Aquinas addresses questions of the doctrine of God, morality, and the sacraments using a strict method: objection, counter-argument, response, refutation — a procedure based on the scholastic disputation practice of the University of Paris, where he taught. The Summa remained unfinished; shortly before his death, Aquinas is said to have described all his writings as "straw." Nevertheless, his thought — summarized under the term Thomism — still shapes Catholic moral and natural law philosophy today. On the 750th anniversary of his death in 2024, the Vatican commemorates this theologian with a 2-euro coin, marking a legacy that, seven centuries after his death, still features in the curricula of theological colleges.