How C.S. Lewis Rationalized His Faith

Capitol Hill Journal ^ | Jan 11, 2006 | Jeff Lukens

[WatchYourself]

Clive Staples Lewis has lately become a rock star within the Christian community. A new movie based on his books, The Chronicles of Narnia, is a blockbuster hit. His books are among the best selling in Christian literature. This is quite a feat for a reserved British intellectual who has been dead for more than forty years.

As a young man, Lewis was a skeptic who dismissed Christianity as a myth. At age 33, with the help of J.R.R. Tolkien and others, he experienced a spiritual awakening. Afterwards, his creativity helped make him a celebrated champion of Christian belief.

The intellectual journey Lewis takes us on in his masterwork of apologetics, Mere Christianity, is truly amazing. In it, he sought to explain the doctrines that Catholic and major Protestant denominations could all agree. He drew upon his former skepticism to help explain Christianity in a common, non-theological way.

[WatchYourself]

Still have to see Narnia...

[CondorFlight]

Perhaps I should date my conversion from the instant I realized that moral theology gave a more accurate account of human conduct than any school of psychology, because it understood that the basis of evil is intentional self-delusion.”

from the novel, "Game of Fox and Lion"
by Robert Chase (cited by The Anchoress)

[sandbar]

Yes, you do. I was just posting on another thread that my family has seen it three times now.

I don't understand how when it is a Christian, you have to 'rationalize' your religion. But if you are Muslim, you are just a part of a 'culture'.

[Donald Rumsfeld Fan]

"You can shut Him up for a fool," Lewis says, "you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to." C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity.

C.S. Lewis's 'Mere Christianity' is the greatest Christian Apologetics of all time.

[txzman]

Any 'non-believer" or 'agnostic' or 'secularist' in my opinion should have to read Mere Christianity before entering any debate on the existence of God.

If you have not read it, whether Christian or not, you owe it to yourself to read this short, simple book. It is an easy read and details, for the layman, why one's own, unaided concept of good and evil is the begining of the thread that brings one face to face with an external and internal God.

A logic, like Paul's, that make it very difficult to walk away unchanged.

[Publius6961]

BUMP!

[EternalHope]

Great article. Thanks for posting.

And, yes, you DO need to see Narnia...

[Pylot]

If you believe in absolutes, belief in God follows.

If you don't believe in absolutes, you probably have not contemplated them much for the arguments that recognize them are pretty difficult to dispell or refute.

[VOA]

"Any 'non-believer" or 'agnostic' or 'secularist' in my opinion
should have to read Mere Christianity before entering any debate
on the existence of God."

And to view PBS's "The Question of God" (even though I hate to
give a plug for PBS!).
The debate between Freud and C.S. Lewis really does a great job
of crystallizing the two schools of Western thought on the ultimate questions.

The included roundtable discussions are good and have a fair mix
of believers, New-Agers, agnostics and skeptics (Dr. Michael Shermer
in the last category).

Website for the series:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/questionofgod/index.html

DVD/VHS and book are also available at PBS's website:
http://www.shoppbs.org/family/index.jsp?categoryId=1862203

[Lorianne]

I recommend Surprised by Joy also by C.S. Lewis on the same subject.

[BibChr]

I recommend Surprised by Joy also by C.S. Lewis on the same subject.

(FWIW, I don't -- and I love Lewis! Most of Surprised by Joy is, imho, deadly dull reading.)

Dan
Biblical Christianity BLOG