Was C.S. Lewis a Catholic convert?

[Karen1996]

I read on another thread that C.S. Lewis was Anglican, not Catholic. Is this right?

Did he eventually convert to Catholicism?

Just curious.

Thanks.

Karen

 

[Steph700]

Karen1996:

I read on another thread that C.S. Lewis was Anglican, not Catholic. Is this right?

Did he eventually convert to Catholicism?

Just curious.

Thanks.

Karen

He didn’t convert to Catholicism unfortunately… but my opinion is if he’d lived just a couple years longer, he would have. He was oh so close on so many subjects! Such a wonderful mind, I love his writings!

 

[Sean.McKenzie]

I don’t believe he officialy converted to the faith, but he was everything a good Catholic should be. I wish he would have converted.

 

[Karen1996]

Thanks guys!

 

[dirtydog]

Karen1996:

Did he eventually convert to Catholicism?

Of course he did - it was just after his body had failed him.

 

[JackmanUSC]

What about Tolkien?

 

[Grace_and_Glory]

JackmanUSC:

What about Tolkien?

Tolkien’s mother was a convert to Catholicism, so he converted to Catholicism as a child. He remained a Catholic for the rest of his life.

 

[JackmanUSC]

Heck Yea.

 

[surfinpure]

Since my own conversion from Protestantism, I have so often lamented that Catholics can’t claim Lewis. Even so, he will always be my literary hero.

*We love you, Jack!! *

 

[Sgt_Sweaters]

JackmanUSC:

What about Tolkien?

Terrifically Catholic. He could never understand why Lewis never converted.

If anyone’s interested, though, there’s a book on the subject of Lewis:
C. S. Lewis and the Catholic Church.

 

[jeffreedy789]

it’s also my opinion (a strong one) that lewis would have converted if he’d lived to see the post vatican II church.

 

[jjwilkman]

anglicans are catholic. just slightly separated. they have ordained bishops and priests. henry viii was the principle problem

 

[Milliardo]

The problem C.S. Lewis had was with the Papacy–he couldn’t accept the teachings about the Papacy, I think, if I am correct.

 

[Sgt_Sweaters]

jjwilkman:

anglicans are catholic. just slightly separated. they have ordained bishops and priests.

“Slightly separated” = in schism with Rome.
Ordination = invalid.

henry viii was the principle problem

I love understatements.

 

[zevel]

For what it’s worth, I found this when I asked Google about Lewis and Catholicism. It’s from a publication called Calvary Contender which seems to be a little broadside put out by a Baptist church in the southern USA…

TOLKIEN, C.S. LEWIS, CATHOLICISM—Jill Saunders, writing in the Mar.-Apr. Canadian Revivalist, says there is much evidence of J.R.R. Tolkien’s devout Roman Catholicism. In a letter to his son Michael, he said: “Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on earth: the Blessed Sacrament [the Mass]”. Tolkien’s wife had to convert to Catholicism on their marriage, and their son, John, became an ordained priest. Saunders adds: “It is interesting that C.S. Lewis converted to Christianity through Tolkien. [They] were close friends for most of their lives and belonged to a literary group called The Inklings, who met weekly at an Oxford pub to drink, smoke, and discuss each other’s stories. While Lewis was an Anglican, he held some R.C. views including its doctrine of purgatory and the Mass; he also requested the ‘Last Rites’ of the R.C. Church on his deathbed.” Tolkien’s *Lord of the Rings *was basically a religious and Catholic work.

 

[judicame]

jjwilkman:

anglicans are catholic. just slightly separated. they have ordained bishops and priests. henry viii was the principle problem

Not just Henry Tudor. It was a whole gang of powerful vultures.

It took more than a century of brutal persecution to separate the English people from their Catholic faith. I recently read Eamon Duffy ‘Stripping of the altars’ which along with his other books documents the piety of ordinary English people before the reformation. If civilization can be judged by personal morality then it’s easy to see why Belloc et al point to the middle ages as the high point of civilization.

It makes you wonder if it’s all still there beneath the surface awaiting leadership willing to rekindle the flame.

 

[judicame]

jeffreedy789:

it’s also my opinion (a strong one) that lewis would have converted if he’d lived to see the post vatican II church.

Why? Did Vatican II make the Church more protestant?

 

[judicame]

To complete the beautiful Tolkein quote:

“Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on earth, the blessed sacrament. There you will find romance, glory, honour, fidelity and the true way of all your loves on earth. And more than that, death. For the divine paradox, that which ends life and demands the surrender of all, and yet by the taste or foretaste of which alone, can what you seek in your earthly relationships: love, faithfulness, joy, be maintained or take on that complexion of reality of eternal endurance which every man’s heart desires.”

zevel:

Lewis…also requested the ‘Last Rites’ of the R.C. Church on his deathbed

That’s interesting. Could that count as a deathbed conversion?
.
.

 

[Milliardo]

zevel:

he also requested the ‘Last Rites’ of the R.C. Church on his deathbed." Tolkien’s *Lord of the Rings *was basically a religious and Catholic work.

Did Lewis receive the final rites in the Church? It would be interesting if he did; question next would be, did he die a Catholic then?

 

[Andrew_11]

C.S Lewis has long been one of my favorite authors and a hero of mine. BTW, Lewis did recieve Last Rites and toward the end of his life would regularly confess his sins to a priest. I do not know if last rites would make him a Catholic. I hope it would.