What would C.S. Lewis do?

[Love_is_Patient]

Like most of you, I C.S. Lewis. His books - my favorite is Screwtape Letters - are brilliant and have led so many to embrace Christianity.

But here’s my question for discussion today:

What church would C.S. Lewis belong to today?

Yes, this is purely speculative. But I think it would be fun to discuss.

Love is Patient

 

[2nd_Adam]

Like most of you, I C.S. Lewis. His books - my favorite is Screwtape Letters - are brilliant and have led so many to embrace Christianity.

But here’s my question for discussion today:

What church would C.S. Lewis belong to today?

Yes, this is purely speculative. But I think it would be fun to discuss.

Love is Patient

CS Lewis like Augustine is well received by Catholics and Protestants alike. FYI… within Protestantism… CS Lewis is known as a gifted writer but is not known for sound theology in many areas of his beliefs.

 

[Love_is_Patient]

CS Lewis like Augustine is well received by Catholics and Protestants alike. FYI… within Protestantism… CS Lewis is known as a gifted writer but is not known for sound theology in many areas of his beliefs.

Don’t you mean, “within some parts of Calvinist Protestantism?”

Love is Patient

 

[GKC]

CS Lewis like Augustine is well received by Catholics and Protestants alike. FYI… within Protestantism… CS Lewis is known as a gifted writer but is not known for sound theology in many areas of his beliefs.

That, of course, would depend on whom you ask. I wouldn’t ask the late John Robbins. for example.

GKC

 

[GKC]

Like most of you, I C.S. Lewis. His books - my favorite is Screwtape Letters - are brilliant and have led so many to embrace Christianity.

But here’s my question for discussion today:

What church would C.S. Lewis belong to today?

Yes, this is purely speculative. But I think it would be fun to discuss.

Love is Patient

This general subject, though not in this specific context, of course, comes up frequently. I recall a lengthy thread on it here, back in July.

I’ve studied, collected and read Lewis for around 45 years. In brief, IMO, he wouldn’t be moving to Rome. He also wouldn’t be happy with the current CoE. But he would remain.
His problems with Rome were best set out in a letter he wrote to an American 8 May, 1945 (which may be read in THE COLLECTED LETTERS OF C.S. LEWIS, vol II, ed. Hooper, pp. 645-646). I don’t have time to quote it all, but what he says there is that he cannot accept what he considers the RCC additions to the universal traditions of historic Christianity.

GKC

 

[2nd_Adam]

Don’t you mean, “within some parts of Calvinist Protestantism?”

Love is Patient

LOL… I don’t think he was a Calviinist. That would have made him sound in doctrine.

 

[AJTheMan]

C.S. Lewis was a committed Anglican, attending the Church of England for his entire life after his conversion. He described himself as neither a high church or low church Anglican.

So, what would C.S. Lewis do? Get baptized by the CofE if he were in the Commonwealth Nations or be baptized by the Episcopal Church if he were in America.

 

[GKC]

C.S. Lewis was a committed Anglican, attending the Church of England for his entire life after his conversion. He described himself as neither a high church or low church Anglican.

So, what would C.S. Lewis do? Get baptized by the CofE if he were in the Commonwealth Nations or be baptized by the Episcopal Church if he were in America.

He was already baptized. The hypothetical question was what would the 1963 Lewis do, if he were alive today.

Lewis when he returned both to Christianity, and slightly later, to the CoE, was not a “church party” man. He was, as you say, neither high nor low. But as he lived his Anglican life, without associating with any party, he moved toward the more Anglo-Catholic docrines: auricular confesion, under the guidance of a spiritual director, acceptance of purgation, and others. He had a famous tift with the concept of Anglo-Catholicism, as he understood T.S. Eliot to embody it, but, at his death, he was definitely leaning toward the Anglo-Catholic particulars in places.

OTOH, he didn’t like church music.

GKC

 

[AJTheMan]

He was already baptized. The hypothetical question was what would the 1963 Lewis do, if he were alive today.

Lewis when he returned both to Christianity, and slightly later, to the CoE, was not a “church party” man. He was, as you say, neither high nor low. But as he lived his Anglican life, without associating with any party, he moved toward the more Anglo-Catholic docrines: auricular confesion, under the guidance of a spiritual director, acceptance of purgation, and others. He had a famous tift with the concept of Anglo-Catholicism, as he understood T.S. Eliot to embody it, but, at his death, he was definitely leaning toward the Anglo-Catholic particulars in places.

OTOH, he didn’t like church music.

GKC

C.S. Lewis considered himself an entirely orthodox Anglican, commenting about the RCC: "‘The real reason I cannot be in communion with you is… that to accept your Church means not to accept a given body of doctrine but to accept in advance any doctrine that your Church hereafter produces’."

It is easy to mistake his Anglicanism for Catholicism. The two faiths differ only in the doctrines but in appearance they look largely similar. Following with the tradition of via media, C.S. Lewis said: "‘When Catholicism goes bad it becomes the world-old, world-wide religion of amulets and holy places and priest craft; Protestantism, in its corresponding decay, becomes a vague mist of ethical platitudes.’"

Anglicanism can be largely confused with Catholicism. Indeed, the two faiths share more in common with each other than they do with mainstream Protestantism. That said, the reason why CS Lewis would come off as Catholic is mainly because most Anglicans accept the doctrine of via media – in the middle of Catholicism and Protestantism.

 

[Roman_Catholic_1]

LOL… I don’t think he was a Calviinist. That would have made him sound in doctrine.

That was the point. Within the Calvinist circles he is not considered a “sound theologian” because he wasn’t Calvinist.

To the original post. I can’t say for sure either way if he would have converted to the Catholic Church or not but since he lived out his life and died as an Anglican this leads me to believe that he would have remained in the Anglican Communion. It is after all what he did while he was alive.

God bless

 

[GKC]

C.S. Lewis considered himself an entirely orthodox Anglican, commenting about the RCC: "‘The real reason I cannot be in communion with you is… that to accept your Church means not to accept a given body of doctrine but to accept in advance any doctrine that your Church hereafter produces’."

It is easy to mistake his Anglicanism for Catholicism. The two faiths differ only in the doctrines but in appearance they look largely similar. Following with the tradition of via media, C.S. Lewis said: "‘When Catholicism goes bad it becomes the world-old, world-wide religion of amulets and holy places and priest craft; Protestantism, in its corresponding decay, becomes a vague mist of ethical platitudes.’"

Anglicanism can be largely confused with Catholicism. Indeed, the two faiths share more in common with each other than they do with mainstream Protestantism. That said, the reason why CS Lewis would come off as Catholic is mainly because most Anglicans accept the doctrine of via media – in the middle of Catholicism and Protestantism.

Yes, I agree with you. My point was that Lewis moved, within Anglicanism, to the Anglo-Catholic position on a number of points.

Your first quote, from the essay entitled “Christian Reunion” certainly expresses what he also said, roughly, in the 1945 letter I mentioned. It was an issue of authority. But be aware that not all Lewis scholars accept the complete authenticity of that essay, as being totally by Lewis’ hand. It is a complicated point.

Your second quote, from THE ALLEGORY OF LOVE, is certainly Lewis. It continues with an amusing point making Plato the Doctor of protestants, Aristotle the Doctor of Catholics.

GKC

 

[AJTheMan]

Yes, I agree with you. My point was that Lewis moved, within Anglicanism, to the Anglo-Catholic position on a number of points.

Your first quote, from the essay entitled “Christian Reunion” certainly expresses what he also said, roughly, in the 1945 letter I mentioned. It was an issue of authority. But be aware that not all Lewis scholars accept the complete authenticity of that essay, as being totally by Lewis’ hand. It is a complicated point.

Your second quote, from THE ALLEGORY OF LOVE, is certainly Lewis. It continues with an amusing point making Plato the Doctor of protestants, Aristotle the Doctor of Catholics.

GKC

Fair enough. I thought you were saying that he was somehow more Catholic than Anglican. Certainly, throughout his life, he preferred the CofE and it’s doctrines and generally rejected the authority of the papacy.

 

[GKC]

Fair enough. I thought you were saying that he was somehow more Catholic than Anglican. Certainly, throughout his life, he preferred the CofE and it’s doctrines and generally rejected the authority of the papacy.

True.

GKC