\n
Dr. Derrick says of the Christmas essay that the editor of The Strand\u00a0<\/em>gave Lewis the topic of preaching about Christmas to modern \u201cpagans.\u201d\u00a0 But Lewis, as he does elsewhere, pointed out the difference between modern day secularists and actual pagans.<\/p>\n\nLewis proceeded to use his Christmas \u201csermon\u201d as an occasion to draw distinctions between the true Pagans or Heathens of old\u2014\u201cthe backward people in the remote districts who had not yet been converted, who were still pre-Christian\u201d\u2014and modern people in Britain who have ceased to be Christians, who are sometimes referred to as \u201cpagans.\u201d To confuse these categories, Lewis says, is \u201clike thinking \u2026 a street where the houses have been knocked down is the same as a field where no house has yet been built. \u2026 Rubble, dust, broken bottles, old bedsteads and stray cats are very different from grass, thyme, clover, buttercups and a lark singing overhead.\u201d<\/p>\n
Real Pagans differ from post-Christians, Lewis continued, firstly in that they were actually religious: \u201cTo [the Pagan] the earth was holy, the woods and waters were alive.\u201d Secondly, they \u201cbelieved in what we now call an \u2018Objective\u2019 Right or Wrong,\u201d that is, that \u201cthe distinction between pious and impious acts was something which existed independently of human opinions.\u201d Finally, Pagans, unlike \u201cpost-Christian man,\u201d had \u201cdeep sadness\u201d because of their knowledge that they did not obey the moral code perfectly. To compensate for this shortcoming, the Pagan developed a wealth of ceremonies to \u201ctake away guilt.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Lewis goes on to unfavorably compare the enchanted worldview of ancient paganism to\u00a0today\u2019s \u201cuniverse of colourless electrons.\u201d\u00a0Dr. Derrick quotes Lewis\u2019s conclusion:<\/p>\n
\n\nIt looks to me, neighbours, as though we shall have to set about becoming true Pagans if only as a preliminary to becoming Christians. \u2026 For (in a sense) all that Christianity adds to Paganism is the cure. It confirms the old belief that in this universe we are up against Living Power: that there is a real Right and that we have failed to obey it: that existence is beautiful and terrifying. It adds a wonder of which Paganism had not distinctly heard\u2014that the Mighty One has come down to help us, to remove our guilt, to reconcile us.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n
\nIndeed, a remedy has been provided for the \u201cdeep sadness\u201d brought onto the world by sin. The very Pagan thing we do on December 25 of \u201csinging and feasting because a God has been born\u201d just may be, Lewis suggests, our \u201cway back not only to Heaven, but to Earth too.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
This essay, \u201cA Christmas Sermon for Pagans,\u201d which\u00a0had also been\u00a0discovered\u00a0by\u00a0Christopher Marsh in 2015, will be published in its entirety in\u00a0VII: Journal of the Marion E. Wade Center<\/em>\u00a0in January 2018.<\/p>\nDr. Derrick also found another essay attributed to Lewis, \u201cCricketer\u2019s Progress,\u201d on the career of the famous cricket player\u00a0Maurice W. Tate, turning into a reflection on the prospects for servicemen adjusting to life after the war.\u00a0 This\u00a0author of this piece was given as \u201cClive Hamilton,\u201d which was a pseudonym sometimes used by Lewis.\u00a0 But it is about sports, a topic Lewis was notoriously uninterested in!\u00a0 Dr. Derrick raises questions about whether Lewis actually wrote this piece, despite the Strand<\/em> indexer\u2019s attribution to him, though she decides that Lewis is just playing with the genre of sports-writing.<\/p>\nAt any rate, it\u2019s good to have more C. S. Lewis, and we can receive\u00a0his \u201cChristmas Sermon\u201d as\u00a0a Christmas present.<\/p>\n
\n<\/p>
Photo, books by C. S. Lewis by Bill Smith via Flickr, Creative Commons License<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The scholar Stephanie R. Derrick tells about discovering two previously unknown essays by C. S. Lewis, including \u201cA Christmas Sermon for Pagans.\u201d In an article for Christianity Today entitled\u00a0Christmas and Cricket: Rediscovering Two Lost C. S. Lewis Articles After 70 Years,\u00a0she summarizes the two articles that were\u00a0published in\u00a0The Strand\u00a0in the late 1940s.\u00a0 Because that\u00a0magazine was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1281,"featured_media":30515,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,20,21,28,43],"tags":[5989,5990,358,1307],"class_list":["post-30471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-apologetics","category-history","category-holidays","category-literature","category-sports","tag-a-christmas-sermon-for-pagans","tag-cricketers-progress","tag-c-s-lewis","tag-literary-scholarship"],"yoast_head":"\n
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