As a Young Man taken by his brother Warren
I would like to continue dealing in shorter articles with Book III. It is here where Lewis discusses the Cardinal and Theological Virtues. These virtues have the power to transform cultures. Lewis speaks in a few words of what a Christian society ought to look like:
Those who do not work, do not eat; everyone is to work with their own hands; they are to produce something good; obedience to magistrates; from children to parents; lending money at interest is forbidden; charity is an essential part of Christian morality; we fear insecurity, which is why we do not give.[1]
Social morality is a natural outworking of genuine faith. History is filled with covenant breakers, and they have never and will never seek the restoration of a purely Christian society, until they embrace a new Lord and turn their backs on Caesar. In the words of C.S. Lewis:
A Christian society is not going to arrive until most of us really want it: and we are not going to want it until we become fully Christian.[2]
To become fully Christian is to see this world as God’s World. All goes back to the issue of sovereignty. Whose sovereignty? God’s or autonomous man? This Christian paradise where God’s law prevails and where Christian man lives as unto the Lord in all things,is not a utopia. Nevertheless, it is an outflow of pure (Mere) Christianity.
It is interesting how dogmatic Reformed Christians are about the transformation that must occur in the individual after conversion. However, they are less than sure about the transformation that must occur when all these individuals begin to interact with society at large. This, once again, is that insipid Christianity that tastes more like Gnosticism than historic catholicity. Andrew Sandlin expressed this well some years ago when he said that if individual sanctification should change the environment you abide, then corporate sanctification will change the environment of the world.
[1] Mere Christianity, pg. 81.[2] Ibid. 83.
One Reply to “C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity: Analysis and Application Part VII”