The Screwtape Letters

I recently discovered these amazing, artistic renderings of sundry Lewis writings (please check them out, O Reader, they are worth your time) and it put me in a mood to re-read Screwtape Letters in particular. It had been quite a while.

For those unacquainted, the book is written as letters from a senior devil to a junior, all of which regard the best ways to tempt a given “patient” (a human) and lead him away from what the devils refer to as “the Enemy,” meaning God.

I forgot how excellent this book is!

I had actually hesitated slightly before re-reading, because I wanted to read it out loud to my husband, and reading in the voice of a devil seemed a little uncomfortable. Of course, Lewis had to write in that voice, mind you. He said it was the easiest book he ever wrote and the least enjoyable, all “dust, grit, thirst, and itch.”

Since my review of Pilgrim’s Regress has turned out to be a helpful post, I decided I could add to the Lewis reviews. If nothing else, this is an exposé on my character, because what I will list here are all the most convicting elements of the Screwtape Letters…all the ways in which I have allowed myself to be fooled, lied to, tricked, and clouded.

1.      Argument style:

This one is best relayed in quotes, as follows. Screwtape is telling Wormwood (the junior devil) to encourage his patient to focus on those little habits or mannerisms of his mother’s which most annoy him so as to damage their relationship by inches and pinpricks.

“Let [the patient] assume that she knows how annoying it is and does it to annoy…And, of course, never let him suspect that he has tones an looks which similarly annoy her.”

Screwtape then advises that the patient be made to speak normal words in a particularly nettling manner, thence to be “surprised” that the nettle finds its mark.

“Once this habit is well established you have the delightful situation of a human saying things with the express purpose of offending and yet having a grievance when offense is taken.”

*Ahem* Reading this passage was like having cold water dumped on my head. Deservedly. I have done this. I have said things in sharp and exasperated tones, then been irritated that anyone should take offense but me. “All I said was such-and-such. How could that possibly hurt your feelings? It certainly wouldn’t hurt mine.”

2.     Approved but inactive virtues:

Along the lines of believing in God—as even the demons do while shuddering—faith without deeds is useless.

“All sorts of virtues painted in the fantasy or approved by the intellect or even, in some measure, loved and admired, will not keep a man from Our Father’s house: indeed they may make him more amusing when he gets here.”

“Here” being hell, remember.

There are so many times where I see a truth but struggle to adhere to it in the clutch. I approve a truth, but do not internalize it. I agree with a truth, but do not apply the discipline necessary to live it. And this is deadly in the most honest sense.

3.     Political Christianity (it doesn’t even matter which side):

When the war (WWII) breaks out Screwtape tells Wormwood that he would do well to try and figure out whether Patriotism or Pacifism would be a better inducement to folly. It’s not to do with which is worse or better, but rather which is better suited to his personality and, therefore, more easily twisted to his endangerment: “All extremes, except extreme devotion to the enemy, are to be encouraged.”

“Let him begin by treating the Patriotism or the Pacifism as part of his religion….Then…come to regard it as the most important part.”

This is something of which we should always be leery: cramming God into a political agenda, even a good one. Now, I have very strong political ideals and leanings. But they must all be measured by a rubric outside of themselves: whatever is not of God must fall off. There is much that is not of God in absolutely every corner of the political field. We must never forget that. We must never fall prey to the belief that ANY earthly faction perfectly represents God’s “interests” or character, for in that moment with have replaced Him with something that is NOT GOD, and it does not matter how good it seems or is. In this case especially, the perceived good is the enemy of the actual great.

AND YET

We must always be “alive to the social implications of [our] religion” even though the intersection of theology and politics is regarded to be an excellent point of spiritual attack.

A tricky situation indeed….a dangerous road that we must nevertheless walk.

4.     Law of Undulation

Simply put, we are rhythmical, amphibian creatures—“half spirit half animal”—and thus we go through peaks and troughs.

Screwtape tells his nephew Wormwood that God appears to use the troughs of spiritual life even more than the peaks…indeed “some of His special favourites have gone through longer and deeper troughs than anyone else.”

A period of spiritual dryness or dullness is neither the loss or end of faith, but the refining of it to great purpose. Remember this. I am telling myself, and anyone else who will listen.

5.      I’ll just leave this quote right here: “An ever increasing craving for an ever diminishing pleasure is the formula. It is more certain; and it’s better style. To get the man’s soul and give him nothing in return…”

6.     In one letter, Screwtape berates Wormwood for having let ‘the patient’ slip back towards the Enemy…and how did this happen? The patient read a book he really liked and took a peaceful walk. Joy, nature, and clear thought become an act of routing the devils’ intentions, or at least taking cover from direct fire. Another thing we would do well to remember.

7.      The combat of daily prayers:

Even Screwtape assumed daily prayers as a given, though of course he regards them as a troublesome barrier to tempting. I forget about this sometimes. Daily prayer. Such a simple, seemingly little thing. But it’s humility, it’s warfare…and it’s necessary.

8.     A Taster of Churches:

Screwtape advises Wormwood “Surely you know that if a man can’t be cured of churchgoing, the next best thing is to send him all over the neighbourhood looking for the church that ‘suits’ him until he becomes a taster or connoisseur of churches.”

This is especially convicting of our broader culture. It often does lead to giving up on church altogether, for all churches have flaws, even drastic ones. She is, after all, made up of humans.

9.     “…zealously guard in his mind the curious assumption ‘My time is my own.’ Let him have the feeling that he starts each day as the lawful possessor of twenty-four hours…the assumption which you want him to go on making is so absurd that, if once it is questioned, even we cannot find a shred of argument in its defense.”

Our time is not our own.

10.   “How valuable time is to us [tempters] may be gauged by the fact that the Enemy [God] allows us so little of it. The majority of the human race dies in infancy; of the survivors, a good many die in youth. It is obvious that to Him human birth is important chiefly as the qualification for human death, and death solely as the gate to that other kind of life. We are allowed to work only on a selected minority of the race, for what humans call a ‘normal life’ is the exception. Apparently he wants some—but only a very few—of the human animals with which He is peopling Heaven to have had the experience of resisting us through an earthly life of sixty or seventy years.”

That’s kind of a thrilling notion, isn’t it? What we experience isn’t just the norm. It’s intense training and preparation.

So I actually had TWENTY-EIGHT bullet points when I started this, but it was getting so long, I decided I’ll save the others for another time. Or perhaps I should just say: read the book, and see what you find.

The Pilgrim's Regress

C.S. Lewis is easily my favorite author, and it’s entirely possible I over-reference him. I often find myself prefacing such references to friends and family alike by saying “I know I used a Lewis quote last time, but it really, really applies.” It may not be the same for everyone—nor do I expect it to be—but something about how Lewis thinks and communicates resonates deeply and effectively with me.

As a result of this, I’m always happy to find that there’s more Lewis out there as yet unread by me. Some years ago I was running my eyes over the books in a bookstore and saw “The Pilgrim’s Regress” by C.S. Lewis. I was very intrigued. Now, I have never read Pilgrim’s Progress (to my shame. It’s on the list) but I know the story from various sources: children’s books, general Christian pop culture, and—believe it or not—an old radio program called “Adventure’s in Odyssey.” Eventually I bought “The Pilgrim’s Regress” and told myself that I was not allowed to read it until I had read the Bunyan book, that I might better understand them both.

My discipline failed, and this last year I broke down, skipped ahead and read “The Pilgrim’s Regress.” Twice. This is not one of Lewis’ more popular books…and understandably so. It is very obscure. But I love it and come now to advocate on its behalf, despite the fact that it is very particular and thick. Lewis himself wrote an afterword in a later edition marking the presence of “needless obscurity and an uncharitable temper.” He added to it summaries of the allegorical intent and explanations of certain terms which were clear to him, but became unknown to later generations, so that the meanings would be rather more accessible to the readers.

There is, in fact, a helpful manual for this book which does much to clarify it…but it is not “Pilgrim’s Progress.” It is “Surprised by Joy.” “The Pilgrim’s Regress” is essentially the story of Lewis’ conversion to Christianity…allegory-style. The obscurities are due to philosophical musing and encounters that Lewis personally experienced, and which are not necessarily universal, or currently widespread in education. The book also has much Greek, Latin, and French and draws upon a greater body of literature and philosophy than I may ever hope to consume in my entire life. There are a few unfortunate metaphors used by C.S. Lewis which smack of Euro- and Ethnocentrism (though, I think, not as badly as some might suspect), and several references to specific trends of the 1920’s and 1930’s. Thus, this book was something of an effort.

But it was worth the effort, and I feel compelled to explain why.

THE TALE

Told as a dream—dreamt by an unnamed narrator—the story follows John, starting from his youth in the land of Puritania (Which is traditional Christianity or perhaps, more accurately, nominal Christianity) and on to his travels throughout the land depicted in the map below:

A few major things define John’s youth: 1. the fear of the Landlord (God as described by parents and clergy alike) and of the great “Black Hole” (Hell as described by the very same), 2. The hypocritical behavior of the Puritanians, and…3. Something which he calls “The Island” or “Sweet Desire.” Sweet Desire comes when one day he looks out and sees an Island which fills him with such longing that, if nothing else in all the world, he longs to long for it. The search for this Island leads him away from the rote Christianity of his youth and towards many dead ends: lust, sensuality, and sentimentality.

It leads him further through many of the beliefs and philosophies of both the current age, and of all ages, as John tries to capture his Sweet Desire through Romanticism (Called “Mr. Halfways in this story…ostensibly because he only gets you halfway there?), as it is nearly killed by Freudianism which attempts to distill us down to very much less than the sum of our parts, then as John (and his Desire) are subsequently rescued by the armor-clad woman Reason, cultivated by the old man Wisdom—father of many philosophers—informed by the hermit History, and finally brought face-to-face with the fact of God, forced by Reason to follow the path towards him. (Of course he could have fought reason, but then he knew he would have fallen with her.)

John’s traveling companion for the majority of his journey is a man by the name of Vertue whose allegorical office lies explicitly in his name. Vertue stands in intended contrast to John. John is driven by desire. Vertue is driven by moral will. The two are often at odds and drawn in different directions, and John parts with Vertue on occasion. John is less concerned with the Landlord’s rules (God’s Law/Morality), and more concerned with finding his beautiful Island. Vertue doggedly, calmly follows the rules, knowing them to be written in the skin of the earth. The only time when Vertue falls—at which time Virtue must be carried by Desire—is when he witnesses the coming nihilism of the peoples of “Marxomanni—Mussolimini, Swastici…”

This book was published in 1933, but Lewis did not feel any express need to heavily veil with metaphor the danger he saw posed by the “revolutionary sub-men of the Left or the Right.” He portrays them as a return to barbarism, causing Vertue himself (itself) to take ill.

The allegorical style gives great room for analysis of philosophy, theology, and of Lewis’ very specific intellectual and spiritual path towards conversion. There is so much being said, that I will not try to get it all down here—rather I will simply examine a few of the driving points in the story which most struck me and encouraged me to read ahead the first time despite “Pilgrim’s Progress” and read the entire thing aloud to my husband the second time, and to now try and convince as many of my family members and friends as possible to read it, so that I can discuss it with them!

THE VERY SHARPEST EDGES

Sweet Desire:

For anyone who has felt that piercing, painful Sweet Desire, the drive John feels to seek it out will easily be understood. Unlike Vertue, who seeks to do right for right’s sake and disdain’s the idea of obeying on behalf of punishment or reward, John is swayed by this desire both below and above Vertue. When Vertue sees Savage Nihilism and falls ill, it is John who must carry him—though he was always the weaker and less willful of the two—for Desire has not died by hearing of depravity.

The trouble with Sweet Desire is that we so easily mistake lesser things for its satisfaction. Then we often become disappointed and confused that the “Desire” has failed us, or wasn’t all it seemed it should be in that moment.

But “It comes from the Landlord (God),” old man History tells John. “We know this by its results. It has brought you to where you now are: and nothing leads back to him which did not at first proceed from him.”

Reason Defeats Freudian Philosophy:

One of the darker sections of the story occurs when John and Vertue part ways, and John finds himself imprisoned by a Giant. Having had his hopes disappointed by Mr. Halfways and his daughter, Media, John realizes that Romanticism is not quite the solution to his question about the Island. John then runs into “Sigismund Enlightenment” (or New Enlightenment) who explains to him that all his desires are merely wish-fulfillment dreams. New Enlightenment claims that “the Island was the pretense that you put up to conceal your own lusts from yourself.”

John is imprisoned by this philosophy which causes him to see himself and his fellow man as nothing more than their innards and sinews and fluids, for the Giant who holds them hostage makes everything “transparent.” The Philosophy desires to ever “uncover” us to our basest, rawest form and, in so doing, makes each man a horrifying concoction of parts to one another and dark or meaningless to himself. John decides that, though he had doffed the belief in a Landlord and a Black Hole, this new philosophy—if true—makes all the world a Black Hole and all men and women residents in it, whether they know it or not.

Then comes Reason: “…a woman in the flower of her age: she was so tall that she seemed to [John] a Titaness, a sun-bright virgin clad in complete steel, with a sword naked in her hand.”

The Giant bids her pass out of his land with all haste. But she will none. She asks him three riddles that, because of his philosophy, he cannot answer. Then she plunges her sword into his heart and defeats him.

She proceeds then to explain to John that the New Enlightenment makes three grave errors of reason. First they say that higher things are the copies or covers of lower things (love a copy of lust, or sweet desire a veil for lust). But how can they tell which is the copy and which is the original? Is not the original normally the higher? An oil painting is better than a print, and lamplight much dimmer than sunlight.

Second, she explains the trouble of our foul-looking innards, which so bothered John and made him feel that all was base and vile forever: “He [The Giant”] showed you by a trick what our inwards would look like if they were visible…But in the real world our inwards are invisible…the warmth in your limbs at this moment, the sweetness of your breath as you draw it in…these are the reality: all the sponges and tubes that you saw in the dungeon are the lie”

(John is unconvinced): “But if I cut a man open I should see them in him.”

“A man cut open is, so far, not a man: and if you did not sew him up speedily you would be seeing not organs, but death. I am not denying that death is ugly. But the Giant made you believe that life is ugly.”

Though she reminds John of some truth mixed in the Giant’s trick—for here our innards represent both themselves and our basest thoughts and desires—“it will do you no harm to remember from time to time the ugly sights inside. You come of a race that cannot afford to be proud.”

Reason’s final killing blow against the Giant is simple. He believes in the doctrine of wish-fulfillment while failing to acknowledge that, for many, the idea that there is no God, no moral law, and no hell would be the wish, and Freudian enlightenment the fulfillment. New Enlightenment does not wish to apply to itself its own doctrine.

And so, by aid of Reason, John passes through “Darkest Zeitgeistheim” and the chains of the Spirit of the Age are broken off of him.

John and Vertue

Lewis makes a point that John and Vertue must ultimately travel together. John, it is implied, comes of Pagan blood…thus the Landlord reaches out to him with Sweet Desire, and images of an island (images that are often, sadly, turned into Pagan idols). Vertue is hinted to have come of the “Shepherd People” (the Jews). Since the Shepherd People were able to read, they were given rules, rather than images.

“But who wants rules instead of islands?” asks John.

“That is like asking who wants cooking instead of dinner,” explains History, who is an old Hermit retiring from the world. He says that the Shepherds were made to begin at the right end, rather than suffering through cycles of mistaking images for reality, and feeling desire followed by despair.

“But were the Shepherds not just as bad in their own way? Is it not true that they were illiberal, narrow, bigoted?”

“They were narrow. The thing they had charge of was narrow; it was the Road. They found it. They sign-posted it. They kept it clear and repaired it…”

History tells John that he must swear blood-brotherhood with Vertue for each the Pagan and the Shepherd is only half a man without the other, and only one—the Landlord’s Son—can reconcile them. So John and his Desire must be reconciled with Vertue and his Moral Will.

Nihilism as three steps North of Humanism

A short but valid point that is as relevant now as it was almost eighty years ago when this was written: John meets in his travels North, a certain fellow named Humanist. I agree with the assessment that Lewis puts forth that Humanism is an intellectually dishonest philosophy. It goes almost all the way along the road of eschewing religion, faith and origins of moral principles (other than “society” or “self”). It wants to get down to the bare essentials of humanity and live at that, but does not want to acknowledge that under such principles as have just been mentioned humans are simply animals, and have every freedom to act as such.

Though the Humanist of Lewis’ day was certainly colder and harder than his current heirs, Lewis says something very powerful and very true when he places Mr. Humanist only a few steps away from total Nihilism, even calling it more foolish than nihilism. Humanist attends the needs of posterity? “And who will posterity build for?” Asks Savage nihilism. “If all men who try to build are but polishing the brasses on a sinking ship, then your pale friends [Humanist and his two friends, Neo-Angular and Neo-Classical] are the supreme fools who polish with the rest though they know and admit that the ship is sinking. Their Humanism and whatnot is but the old dream with a new name. The rot in the world is too deep and the leak in the world is too wide. Better give in. Better cut the wood with the grain. If I am to live in a world of destruction let me be its agent and not its patient.”

And but for the fact of the Landlord, Savage would indeed be right.

Northern and Southern Diseases of the Soul

The aforementioned Savage resides in the extreme North of the allegorical land. It is a place of frigid, barren rock. To the extreme South live the witches and magicians, and it is a festering swamp. The “North” of this story and the “South” of it represent two equal and opposite falls from Grace. Lewis calls them the Northern and Southern diseases of the soul. I found this aspect of the story so poignant that this is actually the second time I have mentioned it in this blog. Briefly, both John and Vertue have to fight the Northern and Southern dragons after they have together taken the plunge (given themselves up for Christ). John must fight the Northern dragon because John has the Southern disease in him, as he was always driven by sensation and feeling, and was weak-willed. Fighting the Northern dragon will gain him toughness of mind and body which he desperately needs to keep to the road.

Vertue must fight the Southern dragon because he suffers from Northern pride and rigidness. If the “Southerners” sink wholly into the flesh, the “Northerners” try madly to scrape it all off to the bone. By fighting the Southern dragon Vertue gains fire—passion and raucous joy. These are the things regarding which his moral will was so wary, but now he may freely enjoy.

In summary, the extremes and follies of mankind are not new, they are old, and both are falls. They are not thought up, they are reacted to: “Widespread drunkenness is the father of Prohibition and Prohibition of widespread drunkenness,” Lewis claims in his afterword.

“With both the ‘North’ and the ‘South’ a man has, I take it, only one concern—to avoid them and hold the Main Road. We must not ‘hearken to the over-wise or to the over-foolish giant’. We were made to be neither cerebral men nor visceral men, but Men. Not beasts nor angels but Men—things at once rational and animal.”

If it sounds like Lewis wants to have his cake and eat it too, I think that’s exactly correct. The crucial point is that he also claims there is only one means by which such a thing is possible…and in order to do that thing, one must first give up the cake, the eating of it, and everything else: the self’s desires and the self’s will.

Last Note: Why is it the Pilgrim’s Regress? It refers chiefly to what happens after conversion…to living in the world and traversing back through it, only now seeing it with the veils lifted.

Searching for the Right Things in All the Wrong Places

Below is my attempt to delve into the appeal of Paranormal literature. Though not so old, it is already becoming dated (Dystopias are the new thing, it seems). Trouble is, I don’t read Young Adult Paranormal literature. I like reading about it, because it produces interesting discussions…I just don’t enjoy reading paranormal romances. Not my thing. The real reason that I even had enough information to write this is because I have a book-review addiction, and an affinity for snark: YA (young adult) paranormal romances produce scads of both. So, having read more reviews and snark pieces on this style of novel that I care to admit, I was more or less able to pick up on the trends as an outsider, and form on opinion on the ‘why’ of the thing.

Bookstore shelves are stuffed to bursting with Young Adult paranormal novels these days. Not only that, but the contents of these novels, per most genre fiction, fit neatly into a comfortingly familiar plot structure; young girl meets mysterious, inexplicable boy who also inexplicably loves her despite her plain humanity. The boy will turn out to be one of the following; fallen angel, vampire, werewolf, faerie king or some such mystical being.

It is not a bad set-up and though the famous (or infamous?) Stephanie Meyer had a firm hand in popularizing the sub-genre, she was hardly the first person to put this fantasy to paper. The appeal is obvious; the tension of two different worlds, a heavily exaggerated version of a cultural or class conflict—a ‘higher’ being drawing a lower into some epic, earth-shattering romance. ‘Meant for each-other’ to the impossible extreme.

Catering largely to teenagers, but appealing to almost the entire age spectrum, the gist I get from my critical-book-review addiction is that most of these tales break down into a series of tension-fraught make-out scenes, with the paranormal conflict laced throughout so as to make all this hormone-charged behavior so much more epic than it would otherwise be.

Is it surprising that teen girls want romance? Hardly. Is it a shock that they find the exploration of sexuality in these books fascinating? Not at all. Is there more to this obsession with otherworldly romance, than meets the eye?

Absolutely. And the desires buried in the text go beyond the secularly obvious.

So let’s begin at the beginning (“and then, when we get to the end, let’s stop!”): Otherworldly. Something beyond our normal parameters. What is it that draws people to the “other” which can’t be defined, contained or at all transformed? It can’t be discarded. The lure is too strong. The mysterious “other” is what it is and it’s worth your time (Why? Because). Some people wonder and question. But she knows. That nameless girl who represents all the heroines in these stories knows. Therein lies the appeal. The very idea that there is no concrete explanation is half the draw.

But, wait a minute…why is it always a girl being drawn “upward” into this mystical romance, and not the other way around? We could cite sexism or marketing strategy. The trope sells like hotcakes. But that’s an insufficient explanation. Why does the formula resonate?

Well first of all, from a strictly story-standpoint…it’s the most basic Cinderella tale: being rescued from the normal, from the mundane, from the unpleasantness of regular life.

But from a broader, spiritual stand-point, I think we can answer that question of resonation when we recall that the church is referred to as the ‘bride’; a woman, plucked from obscurity to become something far beyond her natural capabilities. The same metaphor is used in the Bible to describe God's relationship with Israel, most particularly through the prophet Hosea. She was meant for it, somehow...in spite of the circumstances, and in spite of herself, even.

It should also be noted that there is a male version of this trope and the sci-fi/fantasy world is positively saturated with it. The farm-boy/rogue/outcast who turns out to be the ‘destined-one’/king/savior-of-all-mankind. The parallel here is a bit more overt and accepted than in vampire “chick-lit”. ‘Messiah’ figures in literature are very common. But, for some reason, it’s the bride/Cinderella figure that is the current money-maker, cultivating avid fans who line up for book-number-whatever like it’s Harry Potter or something. (I definitely get the appeal of both tropes, but I like the more action-y fisticuff characters my own self…those are on the up-and-up in YA female-oriented literature as well, a la Hunger Games). It’s a dime novel that doesn’t look like a dime novel, essentially.

The trouble with both tropes is that these messiah-types and lover-hero types, however otherworldly, are inevitably filled with human flaws and selfish actions. Even the ostensibly ‘perfect’ ones come off as tin men and nobody likes them because there’s no such thing. We do not know how to make what we do not understand. We write human messiahs with supernatural powers, because that’s all we can manage. We turn them into the ideals of what we want to be, or how we wish we would be loved. We are trying to satisfy a desire we were created to have…and which can be fulfilled...but only by God.

Vicariousness isn’t gonna cut it…but it sure has oceans of market-appeal: Romance, Sci-fi, Fanstasy, Video Games, Role Playing, Chick-flicks, Super Hero movies etc.

Now what about the fact that, in many of these teen novels, the mysterious male lead often treats the smitten girl condescendingly...even unkindly? He’s a “bad boy.” He’s “dangerous.” What does this say about our society? Do women want to be pushed around without explanation? Do they want to be treated poorly? Must the man keep his epic secrets from them? Must he deal with her so strangely? Must he be so difficult to understand? Must the heroine feels like she’s kept in the dark?

(Frankly that would annoy the ever-loving daylights out of me in a guy character, but okay, it seems to be really popular)

Well, I’m not alone in my belief that women don’t want to be treated like this by any actual, human man (that’s a different discussion called “unhealthy relationships”) but only by a fantasy ideal whose otherwise inscrutable behavior is derived of irrefutably loving motives. They want to be loved and pursued in this very unique way by this incredibly unattainable person. So he gets invented on the page. These heroic figurines can’t live outside of the lines they’re typed in, yet they represent the notion of something powerful and all-knowing that we less-knowing humans long for.

To suss this out, I can only recall that the heroes of both the Old Testament and the New struggled with the genuine hardship of following God. He didn’t always make sense to them. He was not always easy to obey. His judgments could be devastating. His followers have been known to endure heartbreaking delays, persecution and periods of silence, loneliness and pain. Sometimes he permits horrible things to happen to those who love him, as in the cases of Job and Joseph.

But He was worth it to them. He is worth it to us. Also they were worth it to Him, which is the confusing bit. His thoughts are not our thoughts neither are our ways his ways. I’m tempted to say to this entire genre of paranormal romance, as if to a person, “close…so close, but no cigar.” The crucial facts are missing, so the passion is misdirected.

This is where the central problem is. No human is worth this particular breed of trust and devotion. No glittery hero either. So obsessions are created around these human impossibilities to compensate for this giant misdirection away from God towards Man. We should love and serve each other, not idolize each other. Are we setting young girls up to idolize and idealize the men they date/marry? Yes, I suspect so, and it’s easy to see how that will go awry.

It’s perhaps too simple for me to dismiss these teen fantasies as merely that. But in our modern world, in which ‘youth culture’ is dominant and worshiped, the vamp-and-werewolf literature of today probably bears a more accurate representation of people’s deepest desires than the Andy Hardy-and-Nancy Drew of yesteryear. Young adult literature is dubbed excellent if it is bilingual; speaking equally to its target audience and to the generation that raised them.

This is the tricky part; these sorts of books are the fluff of our day. These are the sugar-coating idealists. The wistful dreamers. The seekers of happily-ever-after, producing ‘spunkified’ versions of old-fashioned damsels-in-distress. The cynicism which surrounds these mouthfuls of cotton-candy can quickly melt their thin cry for something ‘other’—oh how much hilarious snark they have produced!—because it is so very thin. It hardly knows what it’s asking for. It’s caught in the mire of a life unperceptive of God.

As C.S. Lewis observed about ungodly or perverse affections, “Eros, turned upside-down, blackened, distorted and filthy, still bore the traces of his divinity.” So, are sewage weeds better than nothing growing at all? At the very least, they show a lack of resignation to the pervading philosophies in which all deep desire is dismissed as childish folly; love is a lie, faith is a fairytale and destiny is for dungeons & dragons.

So perhaps my respect for these pieces of literature is scant, but my empathy is substantial. This washed-out fantasy love can be seen for what it is beneath all the teen angst: yet another translation of a deep, unshakeable desire to know, love and be loved by Someone enigmatically “other”—the only One who stands so wonderfully beyond our natural selves—to be in the otherworld, with the One who created the world.

Dharohar Project: To Darkness and Back

This album (an EP actually) is a collaborative effort between Mumford & Sons, Laura Marling and Dharohar Project and accomplishes the fantastic trick of combining distinct Indian sounds (Rajasthani specifically), with British folk, gorgeous voices and lyrics that you want to eat nice and slow so as to figure out what on earth they’ve been spiced with. I’ve listened to this album over and over and I’m still sorting through some of the words. That, I think, is how it should be.

But actually this isn’t about the album so much as it’s about one of the songs: “To Darkness.” Don’t let the title discourage you—it’s an acknowledgement, not a concession. Here’s the song:

Try as I might, I could not find sufficient sources to incontrovertibly confirm my hearing of the lyrics, but the most crucial ones are consistent, therefore the lyrics are (more or less) as follows, with uncertainties in parentheses, and my comments in italics:

Take my eyes, My whole heart

In your hands, In your hands

And board the (ark)

(As it departs)

Lead me on the shore

But I will hunt no more

I have to pause here for a moment. For me songs are stories. If I don’t see one overtly told, I will dig for it. It’s in there somewhere. So we start with a mournful sound and a sense of loss, and a desire to be taken up—to give up the striving—to be led.

Hold my sin above my head,

Take me home instead,

Take me home instead.

Here they present the soft image of someone lifting a branch out of your way so that it does not obstruct. The hindrance is being held aloft and the pathway made clear for a homeward trek. Again, guidance…being led.

I will not speak of your sin

There is a way out for him

The mirror shows not

Your values are all shot

The first line speaks of forgiveness, the second of a ‘way out.’ Way out of what? The final two lines hint at it: We don’t see ourselves clearly. We don’t understand our own failings by any mere glance in the mirror.

But Oh, my heart

Was flawed, I knew my weakness

So hold my hand

Consign me not to darkness

Here we hit the heart of the song. Again the look outward, the request for guidance. The recognition of flaws, the acknowledgement of weakness. “Hold my hand, consign me not to darkness.” Of whom does the singer demand such a thing? Who can consign or ‘consign not’ to darkness? Who is it that is taking the hand and holding our sin above our heads?

Well, for one (Psalms 107:14) “He brought them out of darkness, the utter darkness, and broke away their chains” and (Psalm 103:12) “as far as the east is from the west, so far has he put our sins from us”

I bring this song up because it is:

A.     Beautiful

B.      Intriguing

C.      Perhaps saying things it doesn’t realize it’s saying (or maybe it does, who knows)

D.     Thematically consistent with Mumford & Sons and Laura Marling’s respective bodies of work (I cannot speak as to Dharohar Project, this is my first time to hear of them).

Both of the above mentioned bands/artists are in a constant state of acknowledging deep flaws (“seal my heart and break my pride, I’ve nowhere to stand and now nowhere to hide, Align my heart, my body, my mind—to face what I’ve done and do my time”—from “Dustbowl Dance” by Mumford & Sons) and this seems a rather rare phenomenon in this day and age where most people like to think we’re all just decent fellows and lasses at heart and it’s just the times or circumstances getting us down here and there.

Both bands also hint at the ongoing struggle that ensues regarding such an acknowledgment (“Pick up your rope Lord, and fling it to me. If we are to battle, I must not be weak”—from “Hope in the Air” by Laura Marling. And “Darkness is a harsh term, don’t you think? And yet it dominates the things I seek”—from “Roll Away Your Stone” by Mumford & Sons)

Long story short? These artists talk about facing our own darkness and about wrestling with God. I don’t know whether or not these artists believe in God, but they sure seem to be shouting upward with better aim than most. I think the awareness they speak of and the longing it calls to the surface is compelling. They want to have it out with God, perhaps, but they admit that he’ll have to pull them to the surface first—we’re at his mercy. Maybe they think they’re singing into the darkness and shadowboxing against the empty air.

But they aren’t. With these beautiful, earnest words, they’re wrestling with the real, live Him—they may get a great, terrifying shock out of it if they don’t already know Him:

“…you have had a shock like that before, in connection with smaller matters—when the line pulls at your hand, when something breathes beside you in the darkness. So here; the shock comes at the precise moment when the thrill of life is communicated to us along the clue we have been following. It is always shocking to meet life where we thought we were alone. ‘Look out!’ we cry ‘it’s alive!’. And therefore this is the very point at which so many draw back—I would have done so myself if I could—and proceed no further with Christianity. An ‘impersonal God’—well and good. A subjective God of beauty, truth and goodness, inside our own heads—better still. A formless life-force surging through us, a vast power which we can tap—best of all. But God Himself, alive, pulling at the other end of the cord, perhaps approaching at infinite speed, the hunter, king, husband—that is quite another matter. There comes a moment when the children who have been playing at burglars hush suddenly: was that a real footstep in the hall? There comes a moment when people who have been dabbling in religion (‘Man’s search for God!) suddenly draw back. Supposing we really found him? We never meant it to come to that! Worse still, supposing He had found us?

So it is a sort of Rubicon. One goes across; or not. But if one does, there is no manner of security against miracles. One may be in for anything.”

-C.S. Lewis in “Miracles”

And I think that about says it.