Aquinas was quite motivated by hot debates, and had many of them with the medieval philosophers and theologians of his day. Aquinas was outspoken and would not back down. This won him both admiration and enemies.
At the end of his life Aquinas was summoned by the Pope to attend the Council of Lyons. It is unclear whether this was to get a good telling off or to be commended for putting down some heretics and enemies of the church. Thomas did not want to go, but started out. The journey to Lyon was to prove his final voyage, as Thomas Aquinas managed to die en route.
In 1273 Thomas had a vision of Christ (it was witnessed by a brother as he prayed in the chapel). After the vision Aquinas wrote no more and did not finish his great work Summa. By the time he died a year later, Aquinas’ spirit was already residing elsewhere, and his body fairly quickly followed.
Thomas Aquinas was made a saint, a Doctor of the Church and a Father of the Catholic Church. Aquinas’ writing on the Doctrine of Creation was adopted by the Catholic Church as it’s own teaching. His writings on theology were taught to men training to be priests until Vatican II in the 1960s.
The Principles of Creation 