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As the industrial revolution rolled to the end of the 19th century, a new revolution began that would transform much of western civilization. The dawn of the 20th century revealed the beginning of a radical shift, in the way many thinkers and leaders viewed the world and our place in it.Ancient documents, previously held to be divine, Biblical truth for centuries, were now seen as only primitive superstitions, comforting illusions, that had nothing to do with reality.
C.S. Lewis: Why He Matters Today. 24 min.
Smart scientists took the place formerly held by philosophy, in the realms of study. That which could be seen, touched and measured, became the only area of study with any claim on truth. Men and women were no longer seen as being created in the image of God, or even created at all. Humans were like all life on earth, merely advanced animals, evolved through meaningless, purposeless chance. And God became merely a figment of childish wishes, something intelligent adults outgrew, like an infant's nursery.
It was into this world that Clive Staples Lewis was born in 1898, and it was here that he was raised and educated. He quickly became one its more vocal adherents. As a young man, he wrote to a friend, "I believe in no religion. There is absolutely no proof for any of them, and from a philosophical standpoint Christianity is not even the best. All religions, that is all mythologies, to give them their proper name, are merely man's inventions."
In 1925, after graduating with highest honors from Oxford with degrees in philosophy and literature, Lewis was invited to join the faculty. Before long, he became close friends with a company of believers, chief among them, J.R.R. Tolkien. Much to Lewis's surprise, it was they who began to influence him, rather than the reverse. Through these friends, Lewis came to see Christianity as intellectually credible, despite his great desire to be simply left alone by God. His great change gradually began to take place. About his conversion, Lewis wrote: "In the Trinity Term of 1929, I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed, perhaps that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all of England."
"After Lewis' conversion, he went on not to just become a Christian, and a strong Christian, but the most influential Christian writer of the 20th century."
. . . . . . CS Lewis Biography -- by Professor Alister McGrath
. . . . . . .The Chronicles of Narnia. --- Full Movie [HD]
. . . . . . . • Mere Christianity
"That they all may be one....." -- John 17:21
NEVER in the history of Western civilization, have Christians of all backgrounds faced such persecution for trying to help people see the humanity of the unborn, honouring the sanctity of marriage, and attempting to protect youth from the media's normalization of sex, drugs, and violence. We fear the worst is to come. Christians have got to cooperate like never before, and it will be easier if we understand each other.
Here we lay Catholic facts at the feet of our Evangelical friends. We are not trying to gloss over differences, but our hope is that all Christians will love one another, as He has loved us (Jn 13:34). We are not apologists. We are simply a Catholic couple responding to Jesus' prayer "that they may all be one, as you Father, are in me and I am in you." (Jn 17:21) "Let us not give up meeting together... let us encourage one another." (Heb 10:25), "Wherever two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them." (Mat 18:20).
"I have a dream: when we let freedom ring, all of God's children, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands." (Martin Luther King, "I have a dream," Washington D.C., Aug. 28, 1963)The Catholic Faith is the Faith of the Scriptures
by David J. Webster, former Baptist Pastor
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