Newman's Grammar, Lewis's Assent by James Como

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Newman's Grammar, Lewis's Assent

James Como on the Debatable Conversion of C. S. Lewis

My belief is that C. S. Lewis was not converted—that is, not as he claimed he was—because he had been (albeit unbeknownst to himself) a believer all along. His upbringing, contrary to his judgment, was not "nominally" Christian. Moreover, we learn, from him, that the books he liked most were by Christians, and even Spirits in Bondage—his first published book, a poem cycle written presumably while he was that "blaspheming atheist," as he called himself—displays a theistic pre-disposition, as does the slightly later Dymer (in which a young man escaping from a totalitarian state begets a monster who, after killing Dymer, becomes a god). Thus his older brother (and closest friend), Warren, could honestly say that what felt to the younger man like a conversion was in fact a recovery from "a long mental illness."

That is why Lewis did an unsurprisingly weak job of explaining his change. It's not that he's all over the place but simply that there are so many places.

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more on C. S. Lewis from the online archives

33.2—March/April 2020

The Fairy Tale Wars

Lewis, Chesterton, et al. Against the Frauds, Experts & Revisionists by Vigen Guroian

19.6—July/August 2006

Our Faith Observed

The Three-Fold Cord of Imagination, Reason & Will in C. S. Lewis by Michael Ward

18.3—April 2005

Lions of Succession

on Being a Free Narnian & the Joy of Subordination by Donald T. Williams


more from the online archives

31.1—January/February 2018

Vikings Under the Son

on Ragnarök, an Extreme Weather Event & the Paths to Conversion by Timothy J. Burbery

32.2—March/April 2019

The Mimetic Bachelor

Reality Shows, Even in a Popular TV Series by C. E. Smith

30.4—July/Aug 2017

Soul Comforter

on Emily Dickinson & the Source of Our Hope by Josh Mayo

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