Dr. Carl Vater has joined the adjunct faculty in philosophy. He is also teaching on the faculty of Saint Vincent College.
An alumnus of Saint Vincent, from which he received a bachelor of arts degree in theology in 2009, Vater completed his doctoral studies in philosophy at the Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C., in 2017. His dissertation was entitled “Divine Ideas, 1250-1325.”
He completed a master of arts degree in philosophy from CUA in 2014. His thesis was entitled “St. Thomas and the Nature of Concepts.” He also has a master of arts degree in theology from Villanova University.
Dr. Vater most recently taught at Saint John Vianney Theological Seminary, Denver, where he was assistant professor of philosphy. During his graduate school years he was a teaching fellow at Catholic University of America.
His areas of specialization include Medieval Philosophy, the Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas, Metaphysics, and the Philosophy of God.
He has had a number of peer-reviewed articles and book chapters published, including “The Absence of Divine Ideas in the Summa Contra Gentiles,” New Blackfriars, (February, 2021). https://doi.org/10.1111/nbfr.12639; “An Inconsistency in Aquinas’s De veritate Account of Divine Ideas” Nova et Vetera 18.2 (2020): 639–52; and “The Role of the Virtus Formativa in St. Thomas Aquinas’s Account of Embryogenesis,” The Thomist 82 (2018): 113–32.
He co-authored, with Timothy B. Noone, “The Sources of Scotus’s Theory of Divine Ideas.” in J.F. Falà and I. Zavattero, Divine Ideas in Franciscan Thought (XIIIth–XIVth century), 85–111. Flumen Sapientiae: Studi sul pensiero medievale 8. Rome: Aracane, 2018.
He is presently revising his dissertation, which is under contract with CUA Press, and which will be entitlted, How God Knows the World: Medieval Theories of Divine Ideas from 1250–1325.
Other ongoing work includes “Aquinas’s Non-Question Begging Argument for the Real Distinction and Composition of Essence and Esse,” “Aquinas’s Ontology from the Perspective of Divine Ideas,” and “Aquinas on Prime Matter: A Reply to Jeffrey Brower.”
He has lectured to the American Catholic Philosophical Association; in the Faculty Colloquium Series, Saint John Vianney Theological Seminary; to The Morris Colloquium in Medieval Philosophy, University of Colorado, Boulder; at The Catholic University of America as well as at Villanova University.
While a student at Saint Vincent, he received the Award for Academic Excellence in Philosophy as well as in Theology in 2009. He presently serves as associate editor, Evangelizare Noviter Journal, fall 2020–present.
While living in Colorado he was involved with his parish, Saint Augustine in Brighton, presenting at Bible study, and volunteering with the middle school youth group, as well as serving as an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion. He has been a member of the Knights of Columbus since 2005.
