C.S. Lewis and the consolation of religion

From the Writer's Almanac for November 29, 2005:

It's the birthday of C. S. (Clive Staples) Lewis, born in Belfast, Ireland, (1898), the author of the children's series about the land of Narnia. He also wrote The Screwtape Letters (1941), in which he wrote, "The safest road to Hell is the gradual one—the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts." He was a confident Oxford philosopher, not at all prepared to find himself a Christian convert. To his friend Owen Barfield he wrote: "Terrible things have happened to me. The 'Spirit' or 'Real I' is showing an alarming tendency to becoming much more personal and is taking the offensive, and behaving just like God. You'd better come on Monday at the latest or I may have entered a monastery." He said, "Talk to me about the truth of religion and I'll listen gladly. Talk to me about the duty of religion and I'll listen submissively. But don't come talking to me about the consolations of religion or I shall suspect that you don't understand."

This is rather timely as the release of Narnia is a little over a week away. I love Lewis' quote on "the consolations of religion."

In our town, we buried 70 people this year. That may not sound like a lot until you know that our town has a population of only 2200! We lost 3% of the town's population by death this year!

And talking about the consolations of religion does very little for deeply grieving people. In fact, I've seen it do much more harm than good. Sometimes words seem so shallow when the pain is so deep!

As a pastor, I find that I often need to give people permission to be angry, to question, to allow themselves to hurt. Sometimes I have to help kick start the grieving process and give them permission to keep it going as long as they need. Many of my pastoral visits following the funeral are sitting with someone, holding their hand, allowing them to weep, and weeping with them. I believe one of the greatest "consolations of religion" as Lewis puts it, is presence. "The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood" (John 1:14, The Message).

More and more, I am convinced that in our ruggedly individualistic, independent, disconnected and fractured society, becoming flesh and blood, and moving into the neighborhood is one of the greatest challenges and opportunities for the Church today.

So how do we move into the neighborhood? And if we do it well, what price is there to pay? What will we sacrifice to make it happen?
Filed in: quotes, C.S. Lewis, ministry