Captain Thin

My friend Karl recently challenged me on Facebook to name ten books that have changed my life. Or, more accurately, I was to “write down ten books that have affected your life in some way and tag ten friends including me so I can see your choices as well.” Ignoring the fact that the word “affected” is “abominably vague” (as Karl also noted), here’s my list. It’s eclectic, to be sure, with fiction, poetry, theology, and more.

The books follow in no particular order.

1. The Chronicles of Narnia – C.S. Lewis

This series served, in many ways, as my gateway to both fantasy and theology. As a child, it was my favourite series of books, and I still reread them all every few years. The Christian symbolism is not something I become aware of until some years later, when my pastor explained it to me. At first I rebelled at the knowledge, but eventually the secret of it (Another story beneath! Deeper magic!) led me to read more of C.S. Lewis, including…

2. Mere Christianity – C.S. Lewis

This. This was my first introduction to serious Christian thought. My first introduction, as it were, to theology. More detailed study into the various focuses of Christian theology came later, as did wide reading in the writings of Christians from across the centuries. But Mere Christianity was, for me, where it all began. And for that, I am truly grateful to C.S. Lewis.

3. The Man Who Was Thursday – G.K. Chesterton

This book was my first introduction to Chesterton, and thus an introduction to numerous other important books in my life (like Heretics, Orthodoxy, Napoleon of Notting Hill, etc). The ability to make the ordinary strange is a particular gift of Chesterton’s and a prevailing theme in much of his other writing; but nowhere is the concept so well enfleshed as it is in The Man Who Was Thursday. This book is my favourite novel, bar none—even if (or perhaps because?) it so often confounds me.

4. The Augsburg Confession (Confessio Augustana) – Philip Melanchthon

The primary Lutheran confession of faith, important not only for articulating Lutheran theology over/against contemporary abuses, but also for stressing the theological continuity of Lutheranism with the faith of the ancient Church. “The churches among us,” Melanchthon writes, “do not dissent from the Catholic Church in any article of faith.” Indeed.

5. The Freedom of a Christian – Martin Luther

Too many people (including too many Lutherans) seem to think that salvation by grace through faith alone means works are excluded from the Christian’s life. Nothing could be further from the truth. In this book, Luther explains the proper relationship between faith and works. While only the former justifies before God, he writes, both are nevertheless necessary in the Christian’s life. This little work, too seldom read, also introduces a number of other important Lutheran ideas, as I’ve summarized elsewhere: “Here Luther touches on the simultaneous sinner/saint state of Christians; explains Law and Gospel; argues justification by faith alone; defends the necessity of works as a fruit of faith; discusses what makes works ‘good’; expounds on the priesthood of all believers (both what it does and doesn’t mean); and delves into his theology of vocation, as well as hinting at the doctrine of the ‘two kingdoms.’”

6. The Spirituality of the Cross – Gene Edward Veith

This is the quintessential introduction to Lutheranism for those wanting to know more about “the way of first evangelicals.” Veith provides a winsome case for the Evangelical Catholic (aka Lutheran) tradition, taking readers on a tour through the major points of Lutheran theology in clear and eminently readable prose. And it never descends into mere academic musings; this is a theology that is forever relevant and applicable to Christians today. Looking for a sacramental evangelicalism? A protestantism that is, at its core, nevertheless catholic? Veith explains why Lutheranism is the church you’re seeking.

7. Poems (1633) – John Donne

Where do I begin? Donne’s poetry, whether focused on the earthly or the divine—and really, Donne would say (and I would agree), everything in creation counts under the category of “divine”—is deeply profound and deeply moving. Meaning is packed tightly into each line, each phrase, like a compressed spring waiting to be released. The Holy Sonnets have especially been important to me in my own spiritual journeys. While what I’m writing here applies to any edition of Donne’s English poetry, there’s something particularly pleasing about holding my reproduction copy of the 1633 edition, as I reflect on Donne’s Holy Sonnets. It provides a tactile experience, a weight in my hands to mirror the weight in my heart—a heart that Donne (and God) batter, for my good.

8. The Pilgrim’s Progress – John Bunyan

I know what you’re thinking: “That old book? That long-on-words and short-on-plot book? That thinly-veiled not-at-all-veiled allegory? Why that book?” I know this book isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but it’s been important to me for a number of reasons, not least of all because Bunyan’s thoughts have helped me formulate my understanding of what literature is for. I also acknowledge this book for Bunyan’s theology of despair, a condition in which I have an interest both personally and academically. Christian’s encounter with Giant Despair is, for those interested, made all the more illuminating when reading it alongside Bunyan’s own spiritual battle with despair (as described in Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners).

9. The Gospel of John

While the Bible in its totality has had an obviously massive impact on my life, the Gospel of John is particularly dear to me. St. John’s surprisingly simple vocabulary make accessible complex theological ideas—mirroring, in a way, the enfleshing of the Divine Word in the Man Jesus. God humbles Himself that we may be brought up—He discloses Himself that we might to know Him Who made us.

10. The Odyssey – Homer

I am a lover of classical mythology and culture, and for me there is no greater story from the era than Homer’s Odyssey. This text led to my wider interest in the literature and philosophy of Ancient Greece and Rome—studies which have significantly impacted how I view all other literature and philosophies.

I can’t help but feel I’ve cut too many books that should also be on this list, just in order to keep it to ten. An expanded list must needs include some classic science fiction (such as the works of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells), children’s adventure stories (Hatchet and My Side of the Mountain), philosophy (Plato), drama (Shakespeare) fantasy (JRR Tolkien), and more from the Inklings (especially Charles Williams’ The Place of the Lion and War in Heaven). I should also mention the first book of C.S. Lewis’ Space Trilogy, as the description of Ransom learning alien language is what first kindled my interest (and subsequent degree) in Linguistics.

But there is one other book I just must mention, and that is C.S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce. Now what is so important about this book you ask? Well, it’s responsible (at least in part) for my marrying Leah. Some years ago, not long after Leah and I had first met, we fell into conversation at a large-group dinner event. We began by chance to speak of Lewis, zeroing in on The Great Divorce. I made some remark about the characterization of George MacDonald in the text. But Leah promptly corrected me, telling me in no uncertain terms I was wrong. Surprised, I actually went home that night and reread the book. Leah was right: I was wrong. About that time I began to realize just how attractive Leah was….

I count it a great blessing that Leah and I can talk so easily together about big ideas, and that each of us can learn from (and correct) each other. But it’s never lost on me that The Great Divorce led, in our case, to a rather Great Marriage.

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Edit (August 27): I have no idea how I forgot to put The Screwtape Letters on this list. Major oversight.

I’ve forgotten to mention a few of my recent articles, so this is somewhat of a clean-up post. These three articles appeared in The Canadian Lutheran between March and June, 2012. The titles and a brief selection appear below, followed by links to the articles online. Given that my column for the July/August issue will be appearing online soon, it makes sense to mention these older ones now.

Let’s start with the most recent article (appearing in the May/June issue). Entitled “A key named ‘Promise,'” the piece uses John Bunyan’s struggle with despair to encourage Christians today who struggle with guilt and worry whether God might not forgive them. Author and scholar Gene Veith had a positive response over at Cranach when this article first came out.

A key named ‘Promise’

Bunyan could find no cure for despair in himself. No, the cure could only be found in the promises of Christ—in the Gospel. And so it is that, in The Pilgrim’s Progress, Christian only escapes Giant Despair when he remembers he carries a key in his bosom. The key’s name is ‘Promise,’ and it opens the prison doors.

Despair was not Bunyan’s problem alone. It existed long before Bunyan, and it continues to plague people long since. We see glimpses of it in ourselves when we worry that we have finally sinned too much. When we fear our faith is not strong enough to save. When we’ve let God down one too many times. But just as it did with Bunyan, Scripture comes running after us in these moments, reminding us of the promises of Christ. The Holy Spirit is at work in the Word, drawing us ever to Himself, opening our hearts to believe the promises of God.

READ MORE

The other two articles appeared in the March/April issue of The Canadian Lutheran. The first, “Gospel-motivated love,” is my column for the issue. It attempts to demonstrate how, in loving our neighbour, we can open the door to evangelism. The second, “Into Africa,” is a feature piece discussing how the Gospel gives us the desire to do social ministry in the first place, drawing on my (then) recent trip to Mozambique, Lesotho, and South Africa. The latter piece (“Into Africa”) was also reproduced in part in Canadian Lutheran World Relief’s May newsletter.

 

Gospel-motivated love

‘I thought I was in the the Twilight Zone,” he told The Christian Post. “These people are acting like what the Bible says a Christian does.” He saw genuine concern for his well-being, despite his opposition to Christianity. And so he turned to the Scriptures, eager to find what could motivate such selfless love. There, by the grace of God, he found Christ.

Let’s be clear: acts of love didn’t convert the man. But they did drive him to the Word of God, the very tool the Holy Spirit uses to engender faith. The good works of Christians pointed him back to the God who motivates good works.

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Into Africa

Just as Christ took pity on the countless sick, the mourning, the poor, and the hungry, we too are called to show compassion to those less fortunate than us, and to share with them the blessings God has bestowed upon us. Indeed, it’s in acknowledging how good He has been to us that we find the impetus to love our neighbour. God first loved us—without our ever deserving it. That selfless love inspires us by the Holy Spirit to love others….

While thanks for salvation may motivate Christians to care for and love each others, that shouldn’t be the only role the Gospel plays. ‘In doing humanitarian work, we must do it in such a way that the world knows that the aid does not just fall from the sky or come out of our pockets,’ Dr. Neitzel explains. ‘We must be clear that there is is Someone who is the provider. And this Someone is the Creator who created us, sustains us, and gave His Son to die for us and save us.’ Loving our neighbours means caring for them in both body and soul. And caring for the soul means proclaiming the Gospel.

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In my previous post, I attempted to articulate why Christians can and, indeed, should study literature. Fundamental to my argument was the idea that, whenever something good is accomplished on earth, God has been at work in and through the human agents involved in bringing about that good. Just as we thank God for providing food for us through the vocation of farmers or healing through doctors, so too, I said, we ought to thank God for the good to be found in secular literature.

But what I did not discuss in my previous article was what exactly I thought was good about secular literature. It is an easy thing to see how other vocations bring good into the world: as I said earlier, farmers provide food and doctors heal. But what exactly do authors (especially authors of fiction) do that is comparable? What is the good purpose that God works through them?

One might be tempted to say that literature is self-evidently good: that “to read the classics is better than not to read the classics,” as Italo Cavillo puts it in his essay “Why read the classics?”. But while the goodness of literature might seem obvious to some, like Cavillo and myself, the same cannot be said for many Christians throughout the history of the Church.

A case in point is Augustine, whose objections to literature and philosophy I explored briefly in my previous post. For him, secular culture represents one direction of the compass and Christianity its complete opposite. We see the same kind of binary thinking about Christ and culture two centuries earlier in Tertullian’s writings as well. “What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?” he scoffs. And again, “What has the Academy to do with the Church?” For Tertullian, the answer was as clear as it was final: nothing at all. That mindset has been inherited by many Christians today: you can have the truth of Christianity or you can have secular culture, but never the twain shall meet.

That assessment would have satisfied many early English Puritans as well. It is perhaps unsurprising, therefore, that John Bunyan includes a defense of fiction at the beginning of his allegorical classic The Pilgrim’s Progress. After all, using fiction (a literary device drawn from secular culture, critics would allege) could obscure Christian doctrine. Fiction was for unimportant, worldly things, the sort of things, in short, which Christians should not waste their time on; what could it have to do with truth, especially the truths of the Christian faith?

Bunyan was facing this sort of criticism before his book ever went to press. Indeed, he tells us directly that some had advised him not to print the book at all. But Bunyan saw such criticisms of fiction as unfounded, and so he takes pains to explain the good that can be brought about through literature. Addressing the reader, he asks,

May I not write in such a stile as this?
In such a method too, and yet not miss
Mine end, thy good? why may it not be done?
Dark Cloud’s bring waters, when the bright bring none.

Just as dark clouds bring much needed rain to the earth, so too Bunyan argues that “some men, by feigning words as dark as mine, / Make truth to spangle, and its rays to shine.” Fiction, he asserts here, can be used to reveal fact. In fact, this is what Bunyan himself is trying to accomplish in his book: “My dark and cloudy words they do but hold,” he writes, “The Truth, as Cabinets inclose the gold.” For Bunyan, fiction has an innate capacity to serve as a vehicle to carry truth.

Of course, Bunyan is here speaking of a specific type of writing which lends itself particularly well to didacticism (namely, allegory), and he is speaking in particular of his own story, The Pilgrim’s Progress. Likewise, when he speaks of truth being made to “spangle” in other literary works, he is undoubtedly referring to Christian texts alone; Bunyan would be less than pleased, no doubt, should he be construed as suggesting that Christians make their search for truth in such books as Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales or Ovid’s Metamophoses.

That all said,  we can nevertheless extrapolate Bunyan’s thoughts on Christian allegory to the world of fiction as a whole. One principle good that literature accomplishes is the revelation of truth – not always overtly, perhaps, and infrequently in as didactic a manner as Bunyan would like. But literature, even secular literature, has the capacity to reveal truth. Or rather, we might say that good literature invites the reader to ask of themselves Pilate’s famous question: what is truth?

Allow me to illustrate what I mean when I say literature asks us to consider truth. When we read distopian fiction, we are led to ask whether our society is evolving, as we would no doubt like to think, or whether instead our culture, left to itself, is moving in a far more worrisome direction. Likewise, the presence of extraterrestrial beings in science fiction forces us to consider the question of what it means to be human. And tragedies are forever asking us to consider the problem of evil and the vanity of this world.

Of course, these questions are not asked of the reader in such explicit terms. Instead, literature offers us another way to address these ideas: the opportunity to live, in some small way, the lives of other people. Indeed, at its core, all literature offers what Bunyan attempts to offer his readers in The Pilgrim’s Progress: the opportunity to temporarily be someone else in order to know the self better.

Would’st thou be in a Dream, and yet not sleep?
Wouldest thou in a moment laugh and weep?
Wouldest thou lose thyself, and catch no harm,
And find thyself again without a charm?

Put simply, literature offers readers the opportunity to enter a state of wakeful dreaming, to indeed live another life. And when we live those other lives, when we share the thoughts, emotions, and actions of authors, characters, and narrators, we return to our own lives wiser for the experience. We lose ourselves, in Bunyan’s words, only to find ourselves again.

That opportunity for experientially gained wisdom is, indeed, one of the fundamental goods that God works through literature. And were it the only good (which it is not), it would nevertheless be justification enough for Christians to take literature seriously. When we read, we become another person in order to grow through that other person’s experiences. So let us then, whenever we approach a poem or novel or any other literary work, heed Bunyan’s advice to the reader: “O then come hither / And lay my Book, thy Head, and Heart together.” For as we become part of the text, laying our head and heart together with the book, we briefly become something we are not; and we do so in order that, when we lay the book down, we would be be more than we were ere we began to read.

[This is the second article in a series exploring why and how Christians ought to engage in literary studies. You can see all the current essays in the series here.]

I’m just filling out my registration information for the University of Regina’s Literary Eclectic conference in September (a task delayed a bit by my not having a very new word processor on my desktop computer. Curse you, .docx files!). I’m presenting a paper entitled “Despair in The Pilgrim’s Progress: Universal Allegory Founded on Individual Experience” which – as might be obvious, considering it’s on John Bunyan – marries my twin passions for theology and literature. Put very basically, I’m exploring the relationship between the popular theology of despair (see my 2009 post “On Despair”) which was sweeping across England in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and Bunyan’s own personal bout of despair as recorded in his spiritual autobiography Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners. [In layman’s terms, “despair” is the condition of those who desire earnestly to be saved by God but believe themselves already condemned or otherwise unforgivable.] In The Pilgrim’s Progress, Bunyan depicts what he believes to be the universal Christian’s experience of despair (in the characters of the Man of Despair and Giant Despair); but this universal depiction’s account of the nature, causes, and cure for despair are fundamentally drawn from Bunyan’s own struggle with despair. While I’m not arguing that the account in Pilgrim’s Progress is therefore autobiographical, I am highlighting how Bunyan’s theology on the subject is drawn from conclusions he made while a sufferer of the condition. In other words, it’s not mere academic theology for Bunyan; it’s theology learned painfully through real-life experience.

Incidentally, the slate I’m on includes presentations on Milton’s Comus and the anonymous Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. It promises to be an entertaining (and enlightening) conference.

Augustine: Despair is the ultimate evil, and most men give themselves to it prematurely. Therefore, I want you to know above all that there is nothing to despair about.
Francesco: Yes, I knew that, but terror made me forget.

Secretum Meum
Francesco Petrarch[1]

This semester, I’m in a class focusing on madness and melancholy in 18^th century England. Currently, I’m preparing a seminar presentation on the subject of Christian melancholy, and as such, I thought I’d write a bit of my musings here for public perusal.

First off, let me explain what I mean by “melancholy.” In contemporary English, the word typically means something like sadness. But the 18^th century use of the word is more for something like depression than just mere sadness. It is to be in a constant state of low-spirits, of great despair and hopelessness.

At first glance, therefore, it may seem perhaps odd that there should be something we call “Christian” melancholy. After all, isn’t the basic tenant of Christianity the complete opposite of hopelessness? Don’t we believe in personal salvation offered to every individual through the sacrifice and resurrection of Christ? And yet, it is undeniable that many great Christians have suffered from bouts of terror when contemplating their sin in relation to the judgment of God. Martin Luther (German reformer), John Donne (Church of England priest and poet), John Bunyan (Puritan author of Pilgrim’s Progress), and William Cowper (Evangelical poet and hymn writer) all struggled with this very issue. How could God forgive their sin, they thought to themselves, when they were so clearly unworthy of such grace?

Compounding the problem for some of these was a fear that perhaps, unwittingly and unknowingly, they might have somehow committed the unforgivable sin Jesus speaks of in Mark 3 and Matthew 12: that of blaspheming the Holy Spirit. If they had done this, even unwittingly, what chance at forgiveness could they have? Bunyan would later reflect that much of the time he was often so afraid that he “was struck into a very great trembling, insomuch that at sometime I could, for whole days together, feel my very body, as well as my minde, to shake and totter under the sense of the dreadful judgment of God, that should fall on those that have sinned that most fearful and unpardonable sin.”[2]

Bunyan, as the others did also, would eventually come through this great trial of spirit trusting more fully in the grace of God than ever before. They realized, as we should realize, that even fearing we have committed this sin is evidence that we have not committed it. For the context of the Scripture verse in question makes it clear that the unforgivable sin (the blaspheming of the Holy Spirit) is in effect a deliberate and final rejection of the authority of Christ’s power and authority. Any person who is afraid they may have committed the “unforgiveable sin” demonstrates that they have not, as they still care about the authority of Christ in their lives. They cannot, therefore, have made a final rejection of Christ. (After all, who fears something that they have completely rejected?).

It is right that we should feel remorse for our sins, but we must not give in to utter despair over them. As Luther has written, “The devil gives heaven to people before they sin, but after they sin, brings their consciences into despair.”[3] In other words, the devil seeks to condemn us after we have already experienced the goodness of God. For once we have felt the grace of God, how much easier it is to make us not only remorseful for our sin (which is proper) but to make us despair that God is willing to forgive us again when we so often sin against Him? How many times, we must wonder, can God forgive us for the same sins,over and over again? And yet Christ has given us the answer to such fears. He has stated that we must forgive (and, by extension, God forgives us) “Seventy-seven times” – that is to say, the complete number times the complete number: in other words, endlessly (Mt 18:22).

Cowper, in one fit of melancholy, tried to end it all. He attempted to bring himself to both drink poison and throw himself from a bridge. But Christ intervened. Whenever he reached for the vial of poison, he found his hands shook beyond control and he felt a voice inside forbid the action. Finally, someone walked in, and the act was interrupted. Cowper felt so ashamed, so certain that this sin could never be forgiven. He had attempted to take his own life.

And yet Cowper would come to recover his faith and find peace again, for a time in the mercy of Christ. As time progressed, however, he lapsed into despair again, certain that he was too terrible to be forgiven by God. And yet Cowper knew the answer to his struggle was to be found in the mercy of Christ. During the intermittent period of assured faith between his melancholic depressions,he would later write the following beautiful hymn, a hymn still sung in churches across the world today. Here are the first and last verses selected for our meditation:[4]

There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel’s veins;
And sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains.
Lose all their guilty stains, lose all their guilty stains;
And sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains.

Lord, I believe Thou hast prepared, unworthy though I be,
For me a blood bought free reward, a golden harp for me!
‘Tis strung and tuned for endless years, and formed by power divine,
To sound in God the Father’s ears no other name but Thine.

Amen. May these words be our own prayer: “Lord, I believe Thou hast prepared, unworthy though I be, for me a blood bought free reward, a golden harp for me.” For only in the mercy and love of God, do we find an answer to despair. Amen.

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[1] Petrarch, Francesco. “Petrarch’s Secret Inner Struggle” from Petrarch’s Secretum, Book 2 (1358). Ed. Davy A. Carozza and H. James Shey, American University Studies, Series XVII: Classical Language and Literature, Vol. 7, P. Lang Publications, 1989.

[2] Bunyan, John. Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners… (London, 1666) as quoted in Baird Tipson’s “A Dark-Side of Seventeenth-Century English Protestantism: The Sin Against the Holy Spirit.” The Harvard Theological Review. Vol. 77. No. ¾. 1984. p. 303.

[3] Luther, Martin The Table Talk of Martin Luther (1556). Section DCXXI. Translated by William Hazlitt. 1650.

[4] Cowper, William. “There is a Fountain Filled with Blood.” Conyer’s Collection of Psalms and Hymns. Ed. R. Conyers. 1772.