{"id":38463,"date":"2019-09-12T09:34:36","date_gmt":"2019-09-12T13:34:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/?p=38463"},"modified":"2019-09-14T22:44:06","modified_gmt":"2019-09-15T02:44:06","slug":"c-s-lewis-childhood-in-belfast-contra-catholicism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2019\/09\/c-s-lewis-childhood-in-belfast-contra-catholicism.html","title":{"rendered":"C. S. Lewis\u2019 Childhood in Belfast & Contra-Catholicism"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Biographers and\/or Friends Kreeft, Pearce, Derrick, and Possibly\u00a0Tolkien Think\u00a0This is Why Lewis Never Became a Catholic<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u00a0This is a discussion from a\u00a0Facebook thread on a recent Anglican convert<\/a>. I\u2019ve known Rob Corzine for almost 20 years. He currently works with Scott Hahn as a Program Director for the\u00a0St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology<\/a>. His words will be in\u00a0blue<\/span>. I have presently added or modified a few things, and added relevant links as well.<\/div>\n
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C. S. Lewis was raised in Belfast, and by his own frank admission to his good friend\u00a0\u00a0J. R. R. Tolkien<\/a>, this had more than a little to do with his never \u201cpoping.\u201d\u00a0<\/span>
\n
\n<\/span>I can\u2019t really buy the \u201cjust couldn\u2019t shake the residual childhood anti-Catholic bigotry\u201d argument for why CSL never became Catholic. It\u2019s psychologically tempting, especially for those of us who benefited so much from his wisdom on our journey into the Church. He saw so much, he was obviously much better read in the Tradition than us, he was also a man of prayer and clearly submitted to the Lord. It seems to call for some extraordinary explanation that he never came the whole way home. After all, how could it possibly be that I was graced to see farther than the great teacher?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

But the Ulster argument fails, I think, on at least two grounds. First, I think it wrongs him. Let\u2019s grant that his friendship with the Catholic Tolkien was old and based on other grounds. His long correspondence published as\u00a0Letters to an American Lady<\/i>\u00a0was always respectful of her Catholicism, but it was hardly a relationship of equals and perhaps he was just being charitable and polite. But look again at his correspondence with Blessed Giovanni Calabria; where\u2019s the bigotry there? or the dissimulation?<\/span><\/p>\n

If the first ground is a notable absence of evidence (for his residual anti-Catholicism), the second ground could be called evidence from absence\u2013absence that is of any developed ecclesiology in his entire body of writing. There is a lovely, if fleeting, reference to the Church across the ages in\u00a0Screwtape<\/i>. Then there is the (wholly inadequate and unbiblical) image of a great house with many equally serviceable rooms in the introduction to\u00a0Mere Christianity<\/i>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Can you think of any others? It is a curious lacuna in such a relatively extensive ouevre. Add to that his strained and evasive responses (the only piece of really poor reasoning that I can recall from his adult pen) when H Lyman Stebbins confronted him directly with the claims of the Teaching Church, and I think a more plausible answer appears. Lewis never found the Church because he never looked for her; he was quite content (and to be fair, not entirely incompetent) to be his own Magisterium.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

At the end of the day, I think we just have to admit that David Mills is right and Joseph Pearce is stretching the data. Lewis, sadly, remained a Protestant until November 22, 1963 (though I\u2019ve no doubt whatever that he is a Catholic now).<\/span><\/p>\n

This theory comes from Tolkien\u2019s report of what Lewis said to him.<\/span><\/p>\n

I do agree, though, that he had a very weak ecclesiology. Catholic author and talk show host Al Kresta has noted that his\u00a0Mere Christianity<\/i>\u00a0was woefully deficient, insofar as it eliminated as basic what is essential to two of the three great divisions in Christianity: the Church. It presupposes Protestant relative ecclesiological minimalism.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I can accept a two-part theory of Lewis\u2019 refusal to pope: a Belfast background and your theory. That seems quite plausible to me. But I can\u2019t discount Tolkien (assuming that story is true): especially given his role in Lewis\u2019 adoption of Christianity and their close friendship.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m sure Tollers\u2019 report is trustworthy, but I\u2019m not familiar with it. Where does it appear? Does it give any evidence that he really wrestled with the question of the Church? Or is it more a matter of \u201cI\u2019m from Belfast; why would I ever pick that room to make my home in?\u201d. It might also make a difference to know\u00a0when<\/i>\u00a0in his life it was.<\/span><\/div>\n

*<\/p>\n

I heard it from the premier Catholic apologist and philosopher,\u00a0Peter Kreeft<\/a>\u00a0(author of several books about Lewis:\u00a0one<\/a>\u00a0\/\u00a0two<\/a>\u00a0\/\u00a0three<\/a>\u00a0\/\u00a0four<\/a>\u00a0\/\u00a0five<\/a>\u00a0\/\u00a0six<\/a>) in an interview on\u00a0Al Kresta<\/a>\u2018s talk show. As I recall, Kreeft said that Tolkien asked Lewis why he wasn\u2019t a Catholic, and Lewis replied (paraphrase from memory), \u201cIf you had grown\u00a0up in Belfast, you would understand and wouldn\u2019t ask me that question.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

If this is a true report, I think it is admirable of Lewis to so honestly admit his biases, and to acknowledge that they had a sort of irrational effect on his position: sort of like Aldous Huxley admitting with remarkable candidness, that he adopted some of his views merely for the sake of sexual freedom.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Tracking down some hard evidence on that incident would be a real find. I know I have seen snippets in Lewis that seem borderline bigoted where Catholicism is concerned, so it did seem plausible to me, but of course that is no\u00a0proof<\/i>\u00a0of its accuracy in the first place.<\/p>\n

Joseph Pearce<\/a>, in his\u00a0C. S. Lewis and the Catholic Church<\/i><\/a>\u00a0(Ignatius Press, 2003) takes a nuanced, moderate position on this:<\/span><\/p>\n

. . . we will be doing him a grave injustice should we fall into the trap of translating Puritania\u2019s importance\u00a0into a presumed omnipotence. It is important but it is not\u00a0that<\/i>\u00a0important.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In essence, although Puritania remained a powerful presence in Lewis\u2019s life, it was by no means an all-powerful presence. It would be truer to say that Puritania cast a shadow across the length of his life. . . .<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

In summary, Lewis\u2019s religious upbringing seems to have been characterized by an inherited anti-Catholicism, whether implicit or explicit, combined with a tepid low-church Anglicanism spiced with Presbyterianism. (pp. 3, 5)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In searching on this topic, I found a remark\u00a0<\/span><\/span>of my own from the Coming Home Network forum (where I was a moderator for three years):
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m convinced Lewis would be a Catholic now if he were still alive. As it was, I heard a story from Peter Kreeft\u00a0that Tolkien asked Lewis one day why he wasn\u2019t yet a Catholic. Lewis reputedly said something to the effect of, \u201cif you had grown up in Belfast, you would understand why.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That\u2019s about it, I think. The leap was simply too great and wasn\u2019t \u201cthinkable\u201d for Lewis. But today, with all the nonsense in Anglicanism, I think it would be a very different story. He would have been an outcast in his own communion. He sort of was, anyway, because there were plenty of Anglican liberals, then, too.<\/span><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Here\u2019s some more. Kreeft states in a\u00a02003 interview<\/a>:
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

The fault is that that is the only subject Lewis didn\u2019t want to talk about, even with his friends, much less in public \u2014 the differences between the churches, especially the differences between the Church of England and the Church of Rome. He addressed issues within his own church and demolished Modernism, which infected (and still infects) all the churches. But he refused to deal with 1517 (or 1054, for that matter.)<\/span><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Why? Both\u00a0Christopher Derrick<\/a>, Lewis\u2019s student [author of\u00a0C. S. Lewis and the Church of Rome<\/i><\/a>: Ignatius: 1981], and Joseph Pearce, Lewis\u2019s biographer, give the same answer: he was born in Belfast and knew his prejudices sat deep.<\/span><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But he [generally avoided this question] for two good reasons. This is true even if the above constitutes a bad reason. For we must take him at his word in\u00a0Mere Christianity\u00a0<\/i>when he says that the reason why he does not address the issues between the churches are these: first, he is not a professional theologian but an amateur whose \u201cexpertise\u201d is in the \u201cbasics.\u201d Second, that he thought God wanted him to address the \u201cbasics\u201d because most Christian writers were not doing so; they were fighting on the flanks while the center was going undefended.<\/span><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He also made very clear, in the preface to\u00a0Mere Christianity<\/i>, that \u201cmere Christianity\u201d is not an alternative to any church, nor itself a church. It is like a hall, from which different specific doors lead out, and only beyond those doors, only in the concrete churches, is there food and fire and bed.<\/span><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Thus, both authors who wrote books specifically devoted to Lewis and Catholicism, give credence to this theory, and a major Lewis scholar today, Peter Kreeft, concurs with it. All three men are or were Catholics (Derrick died in 2007). But I have not as yet found any additional confirming\u00a0<\/i>evidence of Tolkien saying what I heard Kreeft on Al Kresta\u2019s radio show report him claiming about Lewis, Belfast anti-Catholicism, and Catholicism.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
Related Reading:<\/span><\/strong><\/div>\n
*<\/div>\n
C. S. Lewis\u2019 Views on Christian Unity & Ecumenism<\/a>\u00a0[6-16-03]<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Why Didn\u2019t C. S. Lewis Become a Catholic?<\/a>\u00a0[8-29-14]<\/div>\n
\n

Dialogue on Why C. S. Lewis Didn\u2019t \u201cPope\u201d<\/a>\u00a0[9-1-15]<\/p>\n

C. S. Lewis vs. St. Paul on Future Binding Church Authority<\/a>\u00a0[National Catholic Register<\/em>, 1-22-17]<\/p>\n

Why C. S. Lewis Never Became a Catholic<\/a>\u00a0[National Catholic Register<\/em>, 3-5-17]<\/p>\n

C. S. Lewis on Catholicism (Correspondence: 1934-1947)<\/a>\u00a0[9-13-19]<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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***<\/span><\/div>\n
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(originally 6-26-12)<\/span><\/div>\n
*<\/div>\n
Photo credit:<\/span><\/strong> J. R. R. Tolkien (1892-1973): author of Lord of the Rings<\/em>, Catholic,and good friend of C. S. Lewis, in 1916<\/span> [public domain \/ <\/span>Wikimedia Commons<\/a>]<\/span><\/div>\n
*<\/div>\n
***<\/div>\n
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Biographers and\/or Friends Kreeft, Pearce, Derrick, and Possibly\u00a0Tolkien Think\u00a0This is Why Lewis Never Became a Catholic \u00a0This is a discussion from a\u00a0Facebook thread on a recent Anglican convert. I\u2019ve known Rob Corzine for almost 20 years. He currently works with Scott Hahn as a Program Director for the\u00a0St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology. His words […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2331,"featured_media":38532,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[2361,2363,8814,2334],"class_list":["post-38463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-conversion-and-converts","tag-anti-catholicism","tag-c-s-lewis","tag-c-s-lewis-catholicism","tag-catholic-conversion"],"yoast_head":"\nC. S. 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Lewis and Catholicism (Joseph Pearce & Christopher Derrick), give credence to my theory, & Peter Kreeft concurs, too.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2019\/09\/c-s-lewis-childhood-in-belfast-contra-catholicism.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2019\/09\/c-s-lewis-childhood-in-belfast-contra-catholicism.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2019\/09\/c-s-lewis-childhood-in-belfast-contra-catholicism.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"C. S. 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Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Dave was received into the Catholic Church in February 1991, by the late, well-known catechist and theologian, Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave\u2019s articles have appeared in many influential Catholic periodicals, including \"This Rock\" (now called \"Catholic Answers Magazine\"), \"Envoy Magazine\" (Patrick Madrid), \"The Catholic Answer,\" \"The Coming Home Journal,\" \"Gilbert Magazine\" (American Chesterton Society), and \"The Latin Mass.\" He also writes a featured column for every issue of \"The Michigan Catholic\": published by the archdiocese of Detroit, and was editor for most of the apologetics tracts published by the St. Paul Street Evangelization apostolate. Dave\u2019s apologetics and writing apostolate was the subject of a feature article in the May 2002 issue of \"Envoy Magazine.\" He served as the staff moderator at the Internet discussion forum for The Coming Home Network, from 2007-2010. Dave has been interviewed on many nationally syndicated Catholic radio shows, including \"Catholic Answers Live\" (twice), \"Faith and Family Live\" (Steve Wood), \"Kresta in the Afternoon,\" \"Son Rise Morning Show,\" \"Catholic Connection\" (Teresa Tomeo), and \"The Catholics Next Door.\" His large and popular website, \"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism,\" was online from March 1997 to March 2007, and received the 1998 Catholic Website of the Year award from \"Envoy Magazine.\" His blog of the same name (now transferred to Patheos), begun in February 2004, contains more than 1,500 papers, at least 500 debates or dialogues, and over 50 distinct \"index\" web pages. Unsolicited correspondence has indicated many hundreds of conversions (or returns) to the Catholic faith as a result, by God's grace, of these writings. Dave's conversion story was published in the bestselling book \"Surprised by Truth\" (edited by Patrick Madrid; San Diego: Basilica Press, 1994). Sophia Institute Press has published six of his books: \"A Biblical Defense of Catholicism\" (Foreword by Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J., 1996 \/ 2003), \"The Catholic Verses\" (2004), \"The One-Minute Apologist\" (2007), \"Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths\" (2009), \"The Quotable Newman\" (editor: 2012), and \"Proving the Catholic Faith is Biblical\" (2015). He is co-author (with Dr. Paul Thigpen) of the inserts for \"The New Catholic Answer Bible\" (Our Sunday Visitor: 2005), and editor for \"The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G. K. Chesterton\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \"Quotable Wesley\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. They have three sons and a daughter, and reside in southeast Michigan (metro Detroit).","sameAs":["https:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dave.armstrong.798","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@LuxVeritatisApologetics"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/author\/davearmstrong"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2331"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38463"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38463\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}