Classical Theism

In broad terms, a classical theist is someone who believes in a metaphysically simple Being, who is the typically conceived of as the source of all other beings.  And as you say, a Thomist is someone how follows Thomas to some degree in his methods and convictions.

Some non-Thomist classical Theists would be philosophical Muslims, Maimonodes the Jew, Plotinus and Empedocles and the other Neo-Platonists, Plato himself (if you take his very brief mention of the "Good beyond Being" in the republic as a statement of Plato's metaphysical doctrine), Aristotle insofar as his first cause is conceived of as Thought thinking itself, Sankara and Ramanuja and other philosophical Hindus often follow lines of thought very similar to the Neo-Platonists when considering God, and arrive at similar conclusions, and a whole host of other Christian Thinkers that aren't Thomists.

Is there any consensus about foundationalism in epistemology?  Are there sufficiently good arguments for or against it?  Is there any reason a theist or Christian philosopher would be more inclined to one position or the other?

For most of my philosophical education I had learned from and accepted foundationalism as the correct paradigm for analyzing epistemological questions, but if pushed, they seem to always fall into Pyrrhonain skepticism, and in general the approach seems less popular these days (that could be a mis-perception thought).  A few months ago I read Kai-Man Kwan's The Rainbow of Experiences, Critical Trust, and God, in which he argues against foundationalism, and I found it very persuasive.  I'm slowly becoming interested in the state of the contemporary debate on this topic.

Recently, I've been reading a lot of Wendell Berry, and he often talks about creation as viewed by the industrial economy, as something to be used up and consumed, vs. participatory creation.  I know that the idea of participatory creation has its roots in Catholic or Orthodox theology, and I've heard the phrase in other places, besides Berry, but does anyone know more about this concept?  Is there some notable Catholic or Orthodox thinker that discusses creation as being completed and/or perfected when human beings actively engage with it in a dynamic, non-consumerist way?  Any books or authors or recommendations would be appreciated.

Yes it is suicide. But is there ever an ethically sound circumstance in which suicide is to be permitted?

I think there is, yes, but I'm not a practicing Christian.  If you are, I think the church has articulated some good reasons why one ought not commit suicide. 

I find the Stoic ideas on the matter to be pretty reasonable.  In general, suicide is bad, especially if it chosen because of strong emotion.  But if you are terminally ill, will experience immense suffering, large monetary cost to your family, and in the end are going to die anyway, it seems extremely courageous to accept your fate, and willingly walk out the door you are being guided to by your physical situation.  Similarly, if I were to lose all of my mental faculties so that I couldn't reason, think, or remember, I wouldn't feel particularly compelled to hold on to the scraps of a life that wouldn't even be recognizable to the people I knew and loved.  Especially if I am already in old age.

I also don't mean those considerations to be arguments persuading people to take any particular course in their own lives.  I think that in my own life, even if I didn't want to kill myself, I would experience a large degree of indignance at being told by a medical professional, or even a family member, that I was not permitted to end my own life.  This feeling would be greater to the degree that my life was already ending from an illness, I think. 

The myth that we are radically atomic individuals with no duties to others should be overcome when thinking about things like this.  A man with little children for instance, who has time to spend with them, even while terminally ill would be hard pressed to say he has nothing but pain left in his life.  But the inherent dignity of each individual should allow them some leeway in the termination of their own life if fate has assigned them imminent death, or abhorrent conditions as a life-long sex-slave or some other tragically undignified situation.

I think a lot would have to do with the circumstances.  The potential for abuse is massive when you start bringing in other people to decide who is to be killed.

If it is at the request of a sick person, my thought would be that it is identical to suicide in every way except you are asking another human being to fulfill your will for you.  At that point, why not just do it yourself?  Perhaps there are some fringe cases where you can't physically do it, but by and large, mercy killing just seems to be a roundabout type of suicide.