Jeanne Damoff, one of the writers at the blog The Master’s Artist, writes about how C.S. Lewis’s Perelandra “Can Powerfully Inform the Practical Application of Truth.”
Part 1: “The plot basically answers this question: “What would happen if God created reasoning beings on another planet and gave them the same opportunity Adam and Eve had in the garden?†Except, in this case, The Fall has already happened on Earth, The Cross stands as a turning point not only in our world but in all the cosmos, and Satan (The Bent One) is determined to thwart God’s desire to establish perfection and experience unhindered fellowship in a new world.”
Part 2 (aka The Post I Do Not Want To Write): “As far as I can tell, same-sex marriage is as much a threat to the traditional family as drinking bleach is a threat to water. God forbids practicing homosexuality for one reason only: because it destroys the homosexual. Our perspective is all askew. We ask how a loving God could condemn any, when we should be asking how a just God can save any. We live as though the world is our playground and God is supposed to bring the snacks, when in reality we were created by and for His glory and pleasure. We make life about us, when it’s about Him.
God is good in what He forbids. That is what the church should be saying. That is what I should be saying. But apparently we don’t believe it.”
You really should read both parts of Ms. Damoff’s post before you read what I have to say. Maybe you should read Perelandra, too
So, I’m asking myself today: do I believe it? Do I believe that homosexual behavior and gossip and hatefulness and sexual immorality and gluttony and materialism and that other stuff God forbids are all really, really evil and destructive both to the sinner and to the society in which he lives? If I do, why do I keep on doing some of those things? And why do I look the other way and smile ruefully when people I love and care for do them?
And why am I afraid to yell, “Poison!” when I see these things condoned and presented as harmless in the context of children’s and young adult literature. I’m afraid to yell, afraid to even whisper, because someone will accuse me of being homophobic when I say that we ought not be giving books to our young people that present homosexuality as an acceptable lifestyle. (And those young people ought to throw them back in our faces when we do.) I’m afraid of being called elitist if I complain that Gossip Girls and other bitchy teenage books marketed to teen girls are teaching them that it’s OK to live self-centered, malicious lives, that they can live that way and still avoid the tragedy of broken relationships. I’m afraid that when I call it like I see it and say that these two young people who are having sex outside of marriage in the latest YA bestseller should be headed for disaster, according to all the statistics and according to God’s Word, I’ll be called a prude or a book banner or an old lady who just doesn’t understand the beauty of the writing in this bodice ripper or that scifi macho potboiler.
Who am I to say what someone else should read? Nobody, really, just a blogger and a Christian and a reader. And one who has her own struggles with malice and envy and a multitude of other sins, sins that but for the grace of God would destroy me and mine just as surely as other sins, to which I am, thankfully, not tempted, destroy the lives of other people. But when authors lie and say that black is white and evil is good and that a little bit of sin won’t hurt you, shouldn’t I say something, even if it gets me banned from the next BBAW or from the lit blogosphere in general? We’re talking about real lives here. Kids and adults are reading books that say things that are untrue and harmful, and I’m not even trying to have the poison in these books taken off the market or banned in Boston; I just feel called to warn some of those who are headed for a cliff (to mix my metaphors unmercifully) that “something wicked this way comes.”
God forgive me. When I care more about the opinions of people I’ve never met and may never meet than I do about the Truth, I am a coward of the worst sort. I may get banned in Boston myself, or at least not read, but God help me, I will tell the truth about the books that I review. Because GOD IS GOOD all the time, in what He forbids as well as in what He affirms, in His justice and in His love. And I am being a disciple of Christ when I call evil what He calls evil and good what He says is good.
Now go out and get you copies of C.S. Lewis’s space trilogy, especially books two and three, Perelandra and That Hideous Strength, and read some True stories. Amazing stuff.
This is good, Sherry. I find myself turning down review books (even after I’ve having received and started reading them) for these reasons. Maybe I should go ahead and write the review, eh?
Ooops–that should be “even after I’ve receieved them”
Here, here! Bravo and AMEN! I love your blog and reading your reviews. It is so refreshing to hear you tell it like it is. I try to do the same myself but I am always much more… shall we say…. quieter, than you. I respect your unabashedly Christian POV . There are some other bloggers out there who publicly announce they are Christian but from their reviews you wouldn’t ever know it! You have the guts to review those controversial books, such as a book with homosexual characters. I just don’t read those books as I want to avoid having to review them, truthfully. Of course, I have had to deal with all sorts of issues (including the above topic) in my reviews but I never enter into such a review from the beginning, knowingly, as I shy away from the controversy. You are a breath of fresh air in the book blogging world. God Bless the work you do for the community!
Shamefully, I haven’t read Lewis’s Space Trilogy but I’ll have to remedy that one of these days!
I *love* Perelandra, but just barely managed to get through That Hideous Strength and I’m not sure I could do it again.
Good thoughts. I have been surprised when I have pointed out objectionable things in some books to hear Christians make defense of them — not necessarily the activity but the inclusion of them. Discernment is almost a lost art these days.
It is difficult, though in some ways, to know how and when to express these things. I’ve acquired a male gay reader through a friend of a friend, and I find myself questioning my words more now. I don’t want to stymie the truth because it might offend — Jesus said it would offend — but neither do I want to offend unnecessarily, to express truth in an “attack” mode.
You (and Jeanne) are so right that the biggest threat of same-sex marriage is not what it would do to the concept of family, but what it is doing to the soul of those who practice it. Sad that the Christian world cares more about saving its culture from contamination than saving the souls of people.
It’s been ages since I read this series of Lewis — I need to reread it some time.
You ask why you are afraid to yell “Poison.” It’s because you know that such things – as important and right and truthful as they are to you – are still your opinion. What you call the Truth is Your Truth. I don’t say that to devalue it, or to censure your right to speak it. But it’s only in recognizing that we all come through this journey with different opinions, mindsets, struggles, and cultures that we can even begin to understand each other.
As you ask why a book for teenagers features premarital sex, a devout Muslim would question why a book for teenagers features dating and woman with uncovered heads.
I respect your right to review books the way that you want to at Semicolon. I believe that there are many people who agree with you and want to know your opinion, and in that you provide a valuable service.
But when you ask why you’re afraid to say certain things, I suspect that it is not about what you are afraid to be called – whether homophobic or prude – but about what you are afraid to become – intolerant and closed-minded. That fear, that hesitation is coming from inside you to remind you that your opinion, nobody’s opinion, is an absolute.
Yes …. sort of. First of all, it’s not premarital sex in YA books that i object to; it premarital sex portrayed as idyllic and without negative consequences. I don’t even mind that it’s portrayed as fun and fulfilling; sex is both. But when young people (or old people) are “told” that sex is just about pleasure, that there are no emotional and physical (STD’s, anyone?) consequences to uncommitted sex, that’s wrong.
And yes, part of my hesitation is that I will become intolerant and close-minded, or appear to be so. However, I AM an absolutist, and to the extent that makes me intolerant, so be it. In other words, I believe that there are absolute moral laws that, if broken, break the violator of those laws in turn. My opinions about morality are not the absolutes themselves; however, I believe that those moral laws can be discerned from nature (so-called natural law) and that they are taught explicitly in the Bible. And again, if I see you headed for a cliff and say nothing because you don’t believe in the law of gravity, I am both unloving and a moron in my desire to tolerate your disbelief in the law of gravity.
Sherry, you are a Christian for all the world to see. Anyone who comes to your sight may know clearly where you stand on most any subject. I for one appreciate it. Whatever my views on religion or politics, whether I agree with you or not(and I do most of the time), I know I can count on you for a well-thought-out and educated opinion spoken from a kind heart. Be encouraged. Never stop what you’re doing because, though your voice be soft, it speaks for many.
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