VALidations

Mere Christianity is divided into four books.  Book One is titled Right and Wrong as a Clue to the Meaning of the Universe .  Chapter 1 is titled The Law of Human Nature.   Let's start there. "Every one has heard people quarreling."  True enough.  What sorts of things do people say when they are quarreling or arguing?  "She cut in front of me!"  "He took my cookie!"  "I was there first!"  "That is so unfair!"  Just get a group of people together, and you will hear all of these complaints, and an endless list of others.  Lewis elaborates, "Now what interests me about all these remarks is that the man who makes them is not merely saying that the other man's behavior does not happen to please him.  He is appealing to some kind of standard behavior which he expects the other man to know about."  Hard to disagree with him here.  If two people are having an argument, one person is always trying to point out where the othe...

I have been reading some C. S. Lewis this summer.  I am almost finished with Mere Christianity, and I would like to use this blog to write some of my thoughts as I read or outline things from the book that I find interesting or enlightening (which is nearly every word on the page.)  What brought me to start this endeavor?  As the New York Times Book Review puts it, "Lewis is the ideal persuader for the half-convinced, for the good man who would like to be a Christian but finds his intellect getting in the way."  In my own words, "Can you be a Christian and a rationally thinking person at the same time?"  After reading, I hope you will be convinced, as I am, that the answer is YES! In order to start this thing properly, I think I must start with a VERY brief biography of C.S. Lewis, so you can understand a little better who he was and why you should listen to anything he said.  If you are unsatisfied with my account of his life, feel free to do your own re...