More Lewis

"God is love. Again, 'Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us . . . We begin at the real beginning, with love as the Divine energy. This primal love is Gift-love. In God there is no hunger that needs to be filled, only plenteousness that desires to give . . .. To be sovereign of the universe is no great matter to God. In Himself, at home in 'the land of the Trinity,' He is Sovereign of a far greater realm. We must keep always before our eyes that vision of Lady Julian's in which God carried in His hand a little object like a nut, and that nut was 'all that is made.' God, who needs nothing, loves into existence wholly superfluous creatures in order that He may love and perfect them. He creates the universe, already foreseeing--or should we say 'seeing'? there are no tenses in God--the buzzing cloud of flies about the cross, the flayed back pressed against the uneven stake, the nails driven through the mesial nerves, the repeated incipient suffocation as the body droops, the repeated torture of back and arms as it is time after time, for breath's sake, hitched up . . .. Herein is love. This is the diagram of Love Himself, the inventor of all loves." ~ C. S. Lewis, The Four Loves

Till We Have Faces

I just finished reading C. S. Lewis's retelling of the myth of Cupid and Psyche in Till We Have Faces. I spent a lot of the book being annoyed with the protagonist (Orual, the sister of Psyche), but the end made it all worthwhile. It's a very thought-provoking work, to say the least. I feel like I'd need to read the book several times through, and possibly do some background research as well, to fully appreciate all that Lewis does with the myth.

One of the central themes of the book is the Job-like desire the heroine feels to argue her case before the gods. Without giving away too much of the book (I hope), Orual comes to realize that suffering forces us to know ourselves as we really are. Lacking this ultimate honesty, one cannot, in any true sense, speak with the gods. As she/Lewis puts it: "How can they meet us face to face till we have faces?"

I also encountered this idea of suffering as something to be embraced in Graham Greene's novel, The End of the Affair. Greene was a Catholic, so the emphasis on suffering is a bit more to be expected, I suppose. Christian suffering is a scary idea for me, yet it is biblical: "In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood" (Hebrews 12:4). "For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps" (I Peter 2:21). If we are called to suffer, and if suffering produces the sort of clarity of mind that enables us to see God and ourselves in a truer light, I feel like my paradigm needs some significant shifting from its focus around me and my comfort and convenience. Thankfully, I don't think God calls us to be self-flagellants. But I also know that we were not called simply to live the American Dream. If we embrace the Cross, we will be pierced by its thorns and nails, as well as washed in its blood. We're not suffering to earn grace, but to learn just what grace saves us from, and how much it cost. And I think Lewis would say, to rid us of all the layers that prevent us from speaking to God face to face.

Another train of thought triggered by this book had to do with the idea of faces, and how they match or differ from our inner selves. It's so easy to judge people for what they look like, what they say, what they do, how they dress...we all know what it's like to judge and be judged. But if God made each person, even though he or she is fallen, who am I to pass judgment? Not only is that questioning God's abilities as Creator, but it is smugly assuming that I can see past the outside to the core of that individual and appraise his or her innate worth.

Anyway...It's after 1 in the morning, and I am hoping that this post makes sense when I read it during the daylight hours. I will leave you with a quote from Till We Have Faces, as Psyche is preparing to die, to be sacrificed to the god of the Mountain:

"'No, no, no,' she said. 'You don't understand . . .. It was when I was happiest that I longed most. It was on happy days when we were up there on the hills, the three of us, with the wind and the sunshine...where you couldn't see Glome or the palace. Do you remember? The colour and the smell, and looking across at the Grey Mountain in the distance? And because it was so beautiful, it set me longing, always longing. Somewhere else there must be more of it. Everything seemed to be saying, Psyche, come! But I couldn't (not yet) come and I didn't know where I was to come to. It almost hurt me. I felt like a bird in a cage when the other birds of its kind are flying home . . .. The sweetest thing in all my life has been the longing--to reach the Mountain, to find the place where all the beauty came from . . . --my country, the place where I ought to have been born. Do you think it all meant nothing, all the longing? The longing for home? For indeed it now feels not like going, but like going back. All my life the god of the Mountain has been wooing me. Oh, look up once at least before the end and wish me joy. I am going to my lover."

There is life after Ireland

No. 1 Reason to return to the US: Brooke and Levi's Wedding!

The bride and groom make their getaway...


Palmetto Bluffs, S.C.: The incredible location for more pictures after the wedding. We watched the brilliant sunset from a bridge over a small, placid river, and felt like we'd stepped into another world. Then Brooke and Levi set off on their honeymoon, and we went to Savannah to relax.

No. 2 Reason to return...A job

This one I'm not such a fan of. Pretty much anyone will tell you the job market is less than optimal right now, and I'm crippled even more by my lack of experience. Still, it's a good chance to do some growing up, as well as to think creatively about all the possibilities. Plus, I get to live close to some people I truly admire and enjoy spending time with. The downside is...California isn't just a couple hours drive away.