In this episode of Everyday Saints, a Catholic podcast about the real lives of the saints, host John O'Connor tells the story of St. Thomas Aquinas — and it is nothing like what you learned in school.

His own brothers kidnapped him. His family locked him in a tower for a year to stop him from becoming a friar. They sent a woman into his cell to break his vows. And none of it worked.

The man who came out the other side wrote one of the most influential works in the history of Western thought — and then stopped writing completely after a single mystical experience, calling everything he had ever written "straw."

You have been shaped by this man's mind your whole life. You almost certainly didn't know his name.

What you'll hear in this episode:
— Born into nobility: what his family actually wanted for him
— The Dominican friars who changed everything — and what his family did to stop it
— A year locked in a tower by his own brothers
— The "Dumb Ox" who made the whole world bellow
— The Summa Theologica — and why he suddenly stopped writing it
— "All I have written seems like straw" — what that means for everything you are building
— What Thomas Aquinas is quietly asking you today

Everyday Saints is a weekly Catholic podcast telling the real, human stories of the saints in plain language — for regular people with real jobs, real doubts, and real lives. No theology degree required.

New episodes every Thursday.

Host: John O'Connor