A Grief Observed by C.S. Lewis

A Grief Observed by C.S. Lewis

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


A Grief Observed is one of my favorite works by C.S. Lewis. I feel like Lewis’ honesty is what makes it so meaningful. Death and coping with grief is no easy challenge in this life, yet, it is a part of it. Watching my best friend lose her younger brother last December, being with her at the hospital, I remember feeling so completely helpless to ease her pain. I could just be there—be there and let her know that I was there for her. I ended up buying her this book before I had even read it because I thought it would be spiritually uplifting. I didn’t realize until reading it for the first time this week that it is a lot more than that.

What I find most refreshing about this grief observed is that it does not pretend that religion is a magical pill that will alleviate all of our pain in this life. Lewis highlights this well when he says “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 consolation of religion or I shall suspect that you don’t understand” (25). The Atonement of Jesus Christ is a miraculous healer, but it does not work overnight. I like to think that time and Jesus heal all, but that does not necessarily mean we have perfect enough perspective to not be devastated by death. It should help, but it will not make it easy.

And yet, I think that is okay, especially within my own religious tradition as a Latter-day Saint. As Lewis says later in this book, perhaps this is a part of life and learning to become better, though doubts might creep in. But if we look to the Bible we see that Jesus wept for Lazarus even though He knew He could raise him from the dead. In the Pearl of Great Price we see God crying over the wickedness of his creations. Even watching President Hinckley and how he dealt with his own wife’s death was heart wrenching because his sense of deep loss was so apparent.

It is okay to weep. It is okay to mourn for what was and seems lost. It is okay to question at times. It is okay to doubt sometimes as well. The important part is that we work through those doubts and try to remain close to God throughout the process, even if it might feel like the last thing we want to do at the moment.


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Mere Christianity Continued

My favorite section in this book is “Christian Marriage.” It goes hand in hand with his argument for morality (which is really solid and refreshing in our world today), and says that the reason why this is so important to observe is that “those who indulge in it are trying to isolate one kind of union (the sexual) from all the other kinds of union which are intended to go along with it and make up the total union” (105). This reminds me of Jeffry R. Holland’s talk “Of Souls, Symbols, and Sacraments.” It is not that God is just having a great time making rules for us and spoiling our fun, he is trying to show us that we are soiling something sacred that is meant only for the kind of commitment you have in marriage.

I have a lot more thoughts on “Christian Marriage,” but the most powerful part of it was establishing the difference between being in love and the kind of love that follows as a result of it. We have plenty of media propaganda telling us what love is—most of it the glorification of fornication, etc. but this seems to be a bit closer to the line. “Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing” (108). Really though, if we stayed “in love” for too long we would never get anything done. “Knowledge can last, principles can last, habits can last; but feelings come and go.” Lewis continues to say that “ceasing to be ‘in love’ need not mean ceasing to love. Love is this second sense—love as distinct from ‘being in love’—is not merely a feeling. It is a deep unity, maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by (in Christian marriages) the grace which both partners ask, and receive, from God” (109). I have a good friend who once asked me what was more important to me, love or loyalty. When I responded two years ago I said love. My answer is much different now. Marriage is not just about being in love. It is about commitment—something I think society has seriously underplayed when the lovey-dovey wanes.

Mere Christianity

Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Mere Christianity is one of my favorite books of all time. I was excited to have the opportunity to revisit it for this C.S. Lewis class. This review is going to go through a bunch of my favorite quotes and feelings, but to start off let me just say that it is so nice to have someone present a logical argument for Christianity. Nothing frustrates me more than this “modern” notion that having a belief in God means that you are an archaic-thinking, ridiculous moron. It seems so condescending too. Are we really that much brighter than all of civilization up to this point? Do we honestly think that no one gave a good look at religion back in the day and had to come to terms with it? Lewis helps bridge this gap. Not only is it the right thing to do, being a Christian is the sensible thing as well.

One of the initial arguments in this book after establishing that there is a Moral Law is that accepting Christ as a merely a moral teacher is seriously problematic. To accept Him as a moral teacher but not His claims does not even make sense. “Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse…Let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher” (52). Would you honestly want to follow someone’s advice (knowing that there has been plenty of good advice offered throughout the centuries) who was a lunatic and thought he was God? I wouldn’t. Either he is God or he is not. We don’t get half.

The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis

The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The Great Divorce is an episodic book by C.S. Lewis that sets out to teach us that, in the words of George MacDonald as an epitaph for this work, “there is no heaven with a little of hill in it—no plan to retain this or that of the devil in our hearts or our pockets. Out Satan must go, every hair and feather.”

In class we talked a lot about the title and the significance of that. Lewis is clear in this book, as in his others, that pacifism and relativity is not acceptable. To enter Heaven, the only reality, we have to put everything that makes us hellish out of our hearts. The interesting thing that stood out to me, mainly because of the parallel I feel it has to my own faith as a member of the LDS church, is that while Lewis says that he did not mean this to be “a speculation at what may actually await us” (x) in the afterlife, there is something about eternal and gradual progression that he puts a lot of focus on.

You Have to Start Somewhere

So it starts—but that is only half of the story.  

The truth is that my interest in C.S. Lewis began a little over year ago—an interest that kindled to flame, and at some point I decided I needed to take a class on the man to discover more.  

That is why I am here.

I cannot think of anyone in my life that really ever directed me to Lewis or recommended his books, but somewhere along the line I knew I always wanted to read him.  Finally at the age of 20 I started and finished reading The Chronicles of Narnia and a favorite, Mere Christianity, and what can I say?  I am hooked.  Now, there are many different kinds of books.  Some that make you laugh at life for the entertainment value, some that make you want to shoot your brain out (cough—Hemingway anyone?), and then there are those that get you to ask those important life questions—books that inspire and leave you slightly changed having read it.  C.S. Lewis seems to write the latter kind.