The Summa, one argument at a time, in ordinary rooms
Free stories, podcast episodes and videos that dramatise one article of Thomas Aquinas's Summa Theologiae at a time. Invented people argue it out in ordinary places, and every line read as Thomas is his own text in the public-domain 1920 Dominican translation, checked word for word. Both sides get their strongest case.
How each episode works
Thomas wrote every article of the Summa the same way: the objections first, at full strength; then sed contra, “on the contrary”; then his answer; then a reply to each objection. Each episode follows that shape as a story. The people are invented; Thomas is not, and you hear his words read as he wrote them (in English), cut only where marked.
Long-form video with chapters and captions, for YouTube or a classroom screen.
A podcast episode of the same story, with its own RSS feed.
Vertical shorts under a minute, cut around a single objection or idea.
The transcript, with every quotation cited to the question and article.
A night-shift nurse whose patient died at three walks into a bakery where the baker keeps a copy of Thomas Aquinas by the proving cabinet. The Five Ways, read in Thomas's own words, with both of his objections put at full strength.
video 15 min · podcast 15 min · 2 shorts
For parishes, teachers and creators
Everything here is CC BY-SA 4.0. Download the MP4s and MP3s, show them in an RCIA or confirmation class, cut your own shorts, or translate them; credit “Sed Contra” and share your version under the same licence. Every episode is rendered from a plain-text script by free, open-source software (the Kokoro voice model, Pillow and ffmpeg), so the code that made it is public too.
What it is not
It is not a substitute for reading Thomas, for a teacher, or for the Church's own teaching. Each episode ends with the strongest objections modern critics make and where to read more.