Tag: Teaching

The Right Kind of Family Love

On By robstroudIn C.S. Lewis, Christian Life, Christianity, Family, Grandparenting, Marriage, Modern Life9 Comments

People who are wise understand that not all forms of “love” are healthy. That’s obvious with the epidemic of faux love in today’s “hookup culture.”

But even in genuine relationships, such as families, what passes for “love” can become twisted. Even the best of motives can blind us to what’s really best for our children. This sad irony is on my mind right now, since it recently struck close to home.

The title of this post suggests that just as there is a healthy version of family love, there can also be subtle corruptions of that virtue.

Parenting is complicated. We love our children, but if we make “happiness” the primary goal we are missing the mark. This pursuit of what is more often “pleasure” than genuine joy, usually devolves into letting kids do whatever they want. Some people parent this way.

Others are willing to pay the price of helping their children learn the lessons that will lead to a truly meaningful and fulfilling life. This is love. Children raised with the first objective often end up pursuing their appetites. They seldom accomplish much in life and rarely look beyond their own desires, to see the needs of others.

One prominent organization supporting the families of addicts shares the following epiphany.

When I first came to Al‑Anon, I spent a great deal of time wrestling with the term, “enabling.” I am a mother. Surely a mother’s role is to enable her children, is it not? It has been a struggle to understand, let alone accept, that the behavior I viewed as that of a good mother was actually unhealthy!

In his brilliant book, The Four Loves, C.S. Lewis describes how this unbalanced approach can be based in love, but results in unintended consequences.

The maternal instinct . . . is a Gift-love, but one that needs to give; therefore needs to be needed. But the proper aim of giving is to put the recipient in a state where he no longer needs our gift.

We feed children in order that they may soon be able to feed themselves; we teach them in order that they may soon not need our teaching.

Thus a heavy task is laid upon this Gift-love. It must work towards its own abdication. We must aim at making ourselves superfluous. The hour when we can say “They need me no longer” should be our reward.

But the instinct, simply in its own nature, has no power to fulfil this law. The instinct desires the good of its object, but not simply; only the good it can itself give. A much higher love – a love which desires the good of the object as such, from whatever source that good comes – must step in and help or tame the instinct before it can make the abdication.

The internationally recognized Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation offers an article on the subject entitled “Five Most Common Trademarks of Codependent and Enabling Relationships.”

The concept of codependency and enabling sounds simple and straight forward – doing for a loved one what they can and should do for themselves – but it can be incredibly difficult to tell the difference between supporting and enabling a loved one.

So what’s the difference? After all, enablers want to help their loved one, too, and codependency might feel like healthy support. But enabling allows the status quo – drinking or using drugs – to continue, whereas healthy support encourages a person to address their addiction and all of its consequences.

In contrast to this indulgent version of parenting, good parents are able to say “no” to their children, when it is necessary or appropriate. Teaching healthy behavioral boundaries early on teaches kids to make their own, healthy, decisions. Letting them take shortcuts and lie leads to disaster.

God’s divine love is inexhaustible. But God’s approval and blessing are linked to the choices we make. He does not commend self-destructive actions. He still loves, but he makes quite clear the life he desires for his children and the alternative path that leads to Death. God does not prevaricate. God does not hesitate to say “no.”

In the Book of Hebrews, the writer elaborates on this truth – that discipline (not to be confused with anger or punishment) is an evidence of genuine love.

Have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.”

It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons.

Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness.

For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it (Hebrews 12).

Parental Love in Lewis’ Fiction

C.S. Lewis’ classic The Great Divorce creatively illuminates errors that can come between each of us and God’s desire to bless and redeem us, and to usher us into his heavenly presence. In an “encounter” which shows how something as wonderful as familial affection can be perverted into a grotesque distortion of true love.

You should read the entire account in Lewis’ book, but hopefully the selection below will illustrate his insight.

One of the most painful meetings we witnessed was between a woman’s Ghost and a Bright Spirit who had apparently been her brother. They must have met only a moment before we ran across them, for the Ghost was just saying in a tone of unconcealed disappointment, ‘Oh…Reginald! It’s you, is it?’ ‘Yes, dear,’ said the Spirit. ‘I know you expected someone else. Can you…I hope you can be a little glad to see even me; for the present.’

‘I did think Michael would have come,’ said the Ghost . . . ‘Well. When am I going to be allowed to see him?’

‘There’s no question of being allowed, Pam. As soon as it’s possible for him to see you, of course he will. You need to be thickened up [the unredeemed are insubstantial, thus their description as “ghosts”] a bit.’

‘How?’ said the Ghost. The monosyllable was hard and a little threatening.

‘I’m afraid the first step is a hard one,’ said the Spirit. ‘But after that you’ll go on like a house on fire. You will become solid enough for Michael to perceive you when you learn to want Someone Else besides Michael. I don’t say “more than Michael,” not as a beginning. That will come later. It’s only the little germ of a desire for God that we need to start the process.’

‘Oh, you mean religion and all that sort of thing? This is hardly the moment . . . and from you, of all people. Well, never mind. I’ll do whatever’s necessary. What do you want me to do? Come on. The sooner I begin it, the sooner they’ll let me see my boy. I’m quite ready.’

‘But, Pam, do think! Don’t you see you are not beginning at all as long as you are in that state of mind? You’re treating God only as a means to Michael. But the whole thickening treatment consists in learning to want God for His own sake.’

‘You wouldn’t talk like that if you were a mother.’

‘You mean, if I were only a mother. But there is no such thing as being only a mother. You exist as Michael’s mother only because you first exist as God’s creature. That relation is older and closer. No, listen, Pam! He also loves. He also has suffered. He also has waited a long time.’

‘If He loved me He’d let me see my boy. If He loved me why did He take Michael away from me? I wasn’t going to say anything about that. But it’s pretty hard to forgive, you know.’

‘But He had to take Michael away. Partly for Michael’s sake…’

‘I’m sure I did my best to make Michael happy. I gave up my whole life . . .’

‘Human beings can’t make one another really happy for long. And secondly, for your sake. He wanted your merely instinctive love for your child (tigresses share that, you know!) to turn into something better. He wanted you to love Michael as He understands love. You cannot love a fellow-creature fully till you love God. Sometimes this conversion can be done while the instinctive love is still gratified. But there was, it seems, no chance of that in your case. The instinct was uncontrolled and fierce and monomaniac. Ask your daughter, or your husband. Ask our own mother. You haven’t once thought of her. . . .

‘This is all nonsense—cruel and wicked nonsense. What right have you to say things like that about Mother-love? It is the highest and holiest feeling in human nature.’ ‘Pam, Pam—no natural feelings are high or low, holy or unholy, in themselves. They are all holy when God’s hand is on the rein. They all go bad when they set up on their own and make themselves into false gods.’ ‘My love for Michael would never have gone bad. Not if we’d lived together for millions of years.’

‘You are mistaken. And you must know. Haven’t you met—down there—mothers who have their sons with them, in Hell? Does their love make them happy . . ?’

‘Give me my boy. Do you hear? I don’t care about all your rules and regulations. I don’t believe in a God who keeps mother and son apart. I believe in a God of love. No one had a right to come between me and my son. Not even God. Tell Him that to His face. I want my boy, and I mean to have him. He is mine, do you understand? Mine, mine, mine, for ever and ever.’

Exercising the right kind of family love is not always easy. Due to our sinful nature, it is often corrupted. Still, striving to build a healthy (and, dare I say, holy) family is quite an adventure. A final thought from C.S. Lewis.

Since the Fall no organization or way of life whatever has a natural tendency to go right. . . . The family, like the nation, can be offered to God, can be converted and redeemed, and will then become the channel of particular blessings and graces.

But, like everything else that is human, it needs redemption. Unredeemed, it will produce only particular temptations, corruptions, and miseries. Charity begins at home: so does un-charity.

By the conversion or sanctification of family life we must be careful to mean something more than the preservation of “love” in the sense of natural affection. Love (in that sense) is not enough. Affection, as distinct from charity, is not a cause of lasting happiness. Left to its natural bent affection affection becomes in the end greedy, naggingly solicitous, jealous, exacting, timorous. It suffers agony when its object is absent—but is not repaid by any long enjoyment when the object is present. . . . The greed to be loved is a fearful thing. . . .

Must we not abandon sentimental eulogies and begin to give practical advise on the high, hard, lovely, and adventurous art of really creating the Christian family? (“The Sermon and the Lunch”).

Teaching English in China

On By robstroudIn C.S. Lewis, Education, History, Literature7 Comments

CSL China

If C.S. Lewis had desired to teach English in China he would probably have succeeded. However, due to some rather peculiar requirements, he may not have passed muster.

In that Asian nation, you need four years of college to become a teacher. At 山西师范大学 (Shaanxi Normal University) they include another odd requirement. Shaanxi has a minimal height standard. Men must be at least 5-foot-1 and women must be no shorter than 4-foot-7.

C.S. Lewis would have passed this mandate; he was just shy of 5-foot-11. But who knows what other arbitrary dictates may have barred him from sharing his brilliant mind.

The university’s policy came to international attention when the plight of a young student who completed her studies only to be informed that she was four inches too short to receive her diploma. As the BBC reports, there is a waiver for those who wish to teach the very young.

Those wanting to teach at nursery are able to apply for special accreditation if they are five centimetres shorter.

The school’s, albeit flimsy, rationale is that teachers may need to reach high on blackboards when they are teaching their students. (So much for using modern technology to compensate.)*

It would be bad enough if they failed to admit such candidates to their program, but obviously some are not informed of the standard until they have completed their university studies. One can hardly imagine how that unfortunate graduate felt.

C.S. Lewis spent his academic life at Oxford and Cambridge. Although he lectured in a variety of venues, no international university was blessed to have him serve as a visiting scholar.

Fortunately, however, his words reached far beyond the campuses of Oxbridge. And, even though Lewis never taught in China (or in Chinese), his words are available today via translation. At Wheaton College, the Marion E. Wade Center preserves a great deal of information about the Inklings, including some original material.

The Wade’s translation collection has a diverse amount of languages represented, even if only by one book. The languages at the Wade include: Afrikaans, Albanian, Arabic, Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese, Croatian, Czech,  Danish, Dutch, Esperanto, Estonian, Faroese, Finnish, French, Gaelic, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, and Welsh.

A Two-Way Street

Those of us who have taught realize better than others that teachers often learn as much from their students as they offer to them. Preparing to teach demands that we study to know the subject matter as intimately as we can, so we might convey it effectively to others.

Although he was a brilliant teacher, C.S. Lewis was also a diligent lifelong learner.

Lewis held great respect for Chinese civilization. He was interested in the Chinese philosophical concept of the Tao. I’ve written about his thoughts on this subject before.

Lewis viewed the Tao as being similar to what Christian theologians traditionally refer to as Natural Law.

The Tao, which others may call Natural Law or Traditional Morality or the First Principles of Practical Reason or the First Platitudes, is not one among a series of possible systems of value. It is the sole source of all value judgments.

If it is rejected, all value is rejected. If any value is retained, it is retained. The effort to refute it and raise a new system of value in its place is self-contradictory. There has never been, and never will be, a radically new judgment of value in the history of the world.

What purport to be new systems or . . . ideologies . . . all consist of fragments from the Tao itself, arbitrarily wrenched from their context in the whole and then swollen to madness in their isolation, yet still owing to the Tao and to it alone such validity as they possess. (The Abolition of Man)

Lewis was an advocate of what some refer to as Classical Education. It involves loftier goals than simply communicating data. In his essay “Our English Syllabus,” Lewis “propagated education’s end, rather than as the filling of students’ heads with information or their muscles with habits, as the inculcation of virtue.”

Lewis treasured the essence of knowledge rather than its trappings. He was patient with those genuinely hungry for knowledge. But you could also readily apply to him the maxim that he did not suffer fools gladly.

It does not take a genius to discern what C.S. Lewis would have thought about this Chinese height requirement. To prevent a motivated and capable educator from pursuing her vocation simply because she may lack the reach of someone taller, does not pass the test of common sense.

* “The first interactive whiteboard was released in 1991,” and I assume The People’s Republic “magically” secured that very technology no later than 1992.

 

Teaching Kids to Write

On By robstroudIn C.S. Lewis, Family, Grandparenting, My Writing Projects, Writing13 Comments

banner

My grandkids have stunned me with their enthusiasm for writing. And all it took to inspire them was a very simple activity.

I invited our ten youngest grandchildren (aged 4 to 12) to write their own family newspaper. Although I devised our family publication myself, I’ve since learned that there are abundant resources—albeit of vastly different qualities—available online. You’ll find some links below.

The first challenge was to explain to them what a newspaper is. The irony is not lost on me that none of our four families currently subscribe to daily papers. It was more difficult than I anticipated to explain to all of the novice journalists precisely what newspapers are. I use the present tense, because the medium is not quite obsolete, despite the downward trajectory of most local papers. As an editorial in the Washington Post said this year, “newspapers have been dying in slow motion for two decades now.” And it seems to many the process is accelerating.

Nevertheless, as the proud veteran of high school and college newspaper staffs, and a former contributor to my hometown weekly, I believe such publications are ideal for developing writing skills. The passion overflowing from my writing bullpen has vastly exceeded my expectations, confirming my impression.

While it took a while to gather enough submissions for the first issue, they rushed to fill the second. When each was “published,” all of the kids immediately sat down and read their personal issues from proverbial cover to cover.

My endorsement of family newspapers does not carry over to the commercial press. Sadly, too much of what is presented as “objective reporting,” is patently subjective. I debated my journalism profs about that matter forty years ago, and the evidence has only grown more visible. I also agree with C.S. Lewis’ opinion that the majority of what passes for “news,” is superfluous or sensationalistic.

Even in peacetime I think those are very wrong who say that schoolboys should be encouraged to read the newspapers. Nearly all that a boy reads there in his teens will be seen before he is twenty to have been false in emphasis and interpretation, if not in fact as well, and most of it will have lost all importance.

Most of what he remembers he will therefore have to unlearn; and he will probably have acquired an incurable taste for vulgarity and sensationalism and the fatal habit of fluttering from paragraph to paragraph to learn how an actress has been divorced in California, a train derailed in France, and quadruplets born in New Zealand. (Surprised by Joy)

Perhaps ironically, Lewis did not hesitate to publish his own writings in worthy newspapers. Most notably, The Guardian (an Anglican newspaper printed between 1846 and 1951) published several of his essays. In addition, they presented to the world (in serial form) both The Screwtape Letters and The Great Divorce.

For an interesting discussion about C.S. Lewis’ opinion that newspapers are inadequate tools for assessing truth, check out this article. The author draws a valid distinction between Lewis’ example and the current state of affairs where “we judge too quickly and offer grace much too slowly.”

Elements of Our Family’s Publishing Experiment

After describing to the kids what newspapers are, I provided them with a list of potential subject matter. In addition to “standard” sorts of news and reviews, I added things like “sermon notes,” fiction, and comics.

I encourage them to illustrate their own articles, and the first two issues have been graced with images of dogs, horses, King Tut, and a Turtle Bear (who served as a weather forecaster). Each child contributes at their own level, and the cousins commend each other on their efforts.

We’re early in the stages of teaching the kids about rewriting and self-editing. Depending on the situation, either their parents or the editorial staff (grandma and grandpa) assist them with learning to revise their own work.

I must confess that one of the most fun aspects of Curious Cousins Courier is my ability, as the editor, to creatively engage in a bit of editorial privilege. The primary example comes in a “Family Heritage” feature that I write for each issue.

In the first, we considered the life of the cousins’ great-great-grandfather who immigrated from Norway in 1912. Julius Olaissen Næsbø unsuccessfully attempted to travel on the RMS Titanic, but the steerage class was full, and he had to settle for a departure several weeks later. The fringe benefit of reading about “Grandpa Nesby” came in learning that other languages include letters in their alphabet that are foreign to us in the States.

In the second issue, I pointed the children to one of their ancestors who helped establish our country itself, during the Revolutionary War. Joseph Johnston was born in Ireland, and was a sergeant in the Fifth Virginia Regiment.

The importance of cementing family bonds—and instilling a healthy awareness of our family’s legacy—is extremely important to me. I suppose that is due in large part to spending the first third of my life as a nomadic military kid. Yet that sense of disconnectedness from my extended family did not prevent me from inflicting the same itinerant military lifestyle on my own children. But that’s a story for another day.

If you help to establish a newspaper or journal for members of your own family, I trust you will find it as rewarding as I do.

A Few Online Resources

“Get the Scoop: Create a Family Newspaper,” from Education.com

“How to Make a Family Newspaper,” from wikiHow.

The 5 Ws are noted on ImaginationSoup. (In case you’ve forgotten, they’re who, what, where, when and why.)

More developed thoughts, with an eye toward the classroom, are available at The CurriculumCorner.

Tolkien’s Dinosaur Discovered

On By robstroudIn Animals, C.S. Lewis, Church History, Education, J.R.R. Tolkien15 Comments

sauron dino

The “new” dinosaur illustrated above is impressive enough to merit its naming in honor of Sauron in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. Sauroniops, which means “eye of Sauron,” was one of those enormous bipedal predators that Jurassic Park keeps reproducing despite numerous warnings and unnumbered devoured guests. 

Fittingly, the new genus was identified through the discovery of a bone related to the eye socket of the beast. And, as all fans of Middle Earth know, Sauron’s piercing eye marks his terrible presence in the world.

Tolkien isn’t the only author to receive this sort of homage. In a humorous post celebrating the discovery of this new dinosaur in 2012, one writer pointed out:

Last week, the colossal Moroccan theropod Sauroniops joined the ranks of Mojoceratops and Dracorex Hogwarsti, recently discovered dinosaurs named after nerd icons.

sauron skull

As for the Sauronic fossil itself, and its full story of its identification, you can download the complete official report in Acta Palaeontologica Polonica

One of the things that most amazes me about paleontology is the skill (imagination?) they have when they reconstruct ancient life forms with very few fossils. In fact, in the case of Sauroniops, there is only a single bone fragment!

Despite the lack of evidence, it’s probably safe to suppose that Sauroniops was binocular, like other related species. However, that remains conjecture, and it is utterly possible that this new genus was a cyclops variety, more akin to Sauron non corporeal

C.S. Lewis & Dinosaurs

Lewis readily recognized that his deep appreciation for the past made him an oddity in Oxford. He eschewed the essence of the modernism that enraptured most of his peers. Lewis was a man rooted in history. He praised its merits and avoided its pitfalls. All of this, he confessed, made him a “dinosaur.”

He used the image as a metaphor for himself and his vocation, “explaining as clearly as I can the way in which I approach my work.” When he assumed his chair at Cambridge University, he delivered a memorable lecture, entitled De Descriptione Temporum. The text of the entire lecture is available here, but only the pertinent portion is quoted below.

And now for the claim: which sounds arrogant but, I hope, is not really so. I have said that the vast change which separates you from Old Western has been gradual and is not even now complete. Wide as the chasm is, those who are native to different sides of it can still meet; are meeting in this room. This is quite normal at times of great change.

The correspondence of Henry More* and Descartes is an amusing example; one would think the two men were writing in different centuries. And here comes the rub. I myself belong far more to that Old Western order than to yours. I am going to claim that this, which in one way is a disqualification for my task, is yet in another a qualification. The disqualification is obvious. You don’t want to be lectured on Neanderthal Man by a Neanderthaler, still less on dinosaurs by a dinosaur. And yet, is that the whole story?

If a live dinosaur dragged its slow length into the laboratory, would we not all look back as we fled? What a chance to know at last how it really moved and looked and smelled and what noises it made!

And if the Neanderthaler could talk, then, though his lecturing technique might leave much to be desired, should we not almost certainly learn from him some things about him which the best modern anthropologist could never have told us? He would tell us without knowing he was telling.

One thing I know: I would give a great deal to hear any ancient Athenian, even a stupid one, talking about Greek tragedy. He would know in his bones so much that we seek in vain. At any moment some chance phrase might, unknown to him, show us where modern scholarship had been on the wrong track for years.

Ladies and gentlemen, I stand before you somewhat as that Athenian might stand. I read as a native texts that you must read as foreigners. You see why I said that the claim was not really arrogant; who can be proud of speaking fluently his mother tongue or knowing his way about his father’s house?

It is my settled conviction that in order to read Old Western literature aright you must suspend most of the responses and unlearn most of the habits you have acquired in reading modern literature. And because this is the judgement of a native, I claim that, even if the defence of my conviction is weak, the fact of my conviction is a historical datum to which you should give full weight.

That way, where I fail as a critic, I may yet be useful as a specimen. I would even dare to go further. Speaking not only for myself but for all other Old Western men whom you may meet, I would say, use your specimens while you can. There are not going to be many more dinosaurs.

As Lewis was preparing to broadcast this inaugural lecture, the BBC sent him an edited copy of the presentation “designed more than anything else to remove the lecture from the special Cambridge setting.” In his response, Lewis indicated that the dinosaurian references had already gained some public traction.

I return one copy with my corrections which, as you see, embody most of yours. Strictly speaking, if we want to detach it as cleanly as possible from its original academic context, it ought to end with the end of the second para. on p. 17: but as the dinosaur has already achieved some popularity, you may want to keep the rest. I don’t mind either way.

Fortunately, Lewis was not the only dinosaur roaming around, reminding us of important truths. In his closing in a 1955 letter to Dorothy Sayers, Lewis writes:

My brother joins me in all good wishes for Easter. Shd. [should] we someday form a Dinosaurs’ Club (with an annual dinner in the Victoria & Albert)?

In 1957 he would address his renowned friend as “sister Dinosaur.” It would have been fascinating to see who would have joined Sayers on the roster of the Dinosaurs’ Club Lewis imagines.

Sadly, as Lewis’ health seriously declined in 1963, he wrote to a correspondent a sort of epitaph.

Thanks for the kind things you say, but look for no help from me. I am but a fossil dinosaur now.

C.S. Lewis recognized himself to be a dinosaur, as he defined it. And in this comment, he suggests that he is becoming a simple fossil. Fortunately, however, this is one of the cases where he was wrong. Just as Lewis is alive, even now, in the presence of his Savior, so too his words continue to speak life and wisdom to our confused world.

Rewarding Destructive Behaviors

On By robstroudIn Animals, C.S. Lewis, Family, Humor, Potentially Useful Trivia, Theological Matters15 Comments

monopoly

It is almost too obvious to require saying: you reinforce the behaviors you reward. Why then, would any society intentionally train its youth to be dishonest?

One justification I’ve heard, more and more frequently in recent years, is that it’s all about winning—coming out on top. The motto of these folks is “do whatever it takes to win.” Yet this is a recipe for a disastrous life. In the words of Jesus: “what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?” (Luke 9:25)*

Our recreational choices say a lot about us and our values. Digital options have reduced the influence of board games, so one perennial favorite has devised a strategy to regain its market share.

Monopoly is based on accumulating wealth and, for the merciless, crushing one’s competitors. Some might argue that the capitalism which provides the basis for the game is corrupt in and of itself. Still, Monopoly has always had clear rules that governed actions.

But some players cheated. Capitalizing on this sinister impulse, Monopoly has created a new “Cheaters Edition.” Yes, you read that right.

Christian publications have announced the game’s arrival. The current issue of Citizen notes that even though cheating is actively encouraged in the game, negative consequences are also possible.

Mind you, it’s not that anything goes. Cheat successfully and you get rewarded; get caught and you get punished.

Even the “secular” Bloomberg review of the new game acknowledges the moral confusion of the product, closing its report with:

Clearly this begs some deeper philosophical questions about modern life and the future of morality and humanity, but, wait, did you just land on Boardwalk? Yes, I definitely always had a hotel on there! Trust me.

Nurturing Healthy Behaviors

One does not have to be a parent to recognize this wisdom of this Proverb: “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6).

In fact, even pet “owners” know the necessity of training (e.g. housebreaking) our canine and feline family members.

Many games highlight positive choices, consciously or subconsciously reinforcing good. The simplest and most common method for this process comes not in a board game or a digital alternative. It is found in verbal praise.

There is ongoing debate about the value of praise. It’s clear that insincere or mechanistic praise would be of insignificant worth, and potentially dangerous. Some psychologists go so far as to state that “Positive reinforcement can undercut a child’s intrinsic motivation.”

C.S. Lewis understood that we cannot manufacture our own motivations.

I cannot, by direct moral effort, give myself new motives. After the first few steps in the Christian life we realise that everything which really needs to be done in our souls can be done only by God (Mere Christianity).

Despite this truth, it is also argued that our character can be shaped, in a sense, by consciously and repeatedly choosing to do what is right. Gradually then, by God’s grace, obedience may gradually give way to a more honest and natural motivation as the positive paths become our normal, well-traveled path.

This is not simply a “Christian” concern. The philosopher Aristotle noted “Good habits formed during youth make all the difference.” (What do you think Aristotle would think about the Cheater’s Edition of Monopoly?)

C.S. Lewis would doubtless concur with Aristotle. I assume most of Mere Inkling’s readers agree with the ancient wisdom as well.

A final thought. This cheater’s edition of Monopoly probably possesses less power to damage lives than Hasbro’s Ouijà board game. But that’s a subject for another day

* In Matthew 16 we read the more familiar “For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?”

cheat card

Professor Bob Dylan

On By robstroudIn C.S. Lewis, Christian Life, Christianity, Music, Poetry, The Future, Writing13 Comments

dylanCan you imagine having singer Bob Dylan as your high school history teacher?

According to a recent interview,* it could have happened.

Still actively touring in his seventies and considered an American musical icon. I was stunned to hear what he said about another path his life may have taken. The interviewer posted the remark this way:

Bob Dylan: His True Calling

“If I had to do it all over again, I’d be a schoolteacher—probably teach Roman history or theology.”

I didn’t realize he and I had so much in common! When I did my undergrad studies in history, I took every Roman history course the University of Washington offered. As for theology . . . well, having become a pastor, my interest in the study of God’s revelation of himself to the world is a given.

Can you imagine Dylan lecturing on apotheosis in the early empire? [Apotheosis is the elevation of a person to godhood, and was a formal event after the death of some emperors. The emperors themselves knew it was a farce, of course. Seneca wrote that emperor Vespasian, on his deathbed, actually said, “Alas, I think I’m becoming a God.”]

Bob Dylan’s interest in spiritual matters is genuine. He has high praise in the interview for Billy Graham. “This guy was rock ‘n’ roll personified. He filled football stadiums before Mick Jagger did.”

In 1979, Dylan released the first of three “Christian” albums, “Slow Train Coming.” It has a number of great pieces, and I listen to the album at least once a month. One song, “Gotta Serve Somebody,” won him the Grammy that year for “Best Male Vocalist.” It’s lyrics are sobering, and everyone should hear it at least once.

And, Speaking of C.S. Lewis

Well, we weren’t actually. But, here at Mere Inkling we usually do.

These two men bear some obvious parallels. They are masters of words. Poets extraordinaire. Lewis and Dylan both possess enviable creative imaginations. Each has accumulated a vast legacy in their work, which will continue to inspire for many generations to come.

I also learned this on the internet—they share the same Myers-Briggs personality type. At least, this site claims they are both INFPs. (I’m an ENTJ myself, a common personality aggregate for pastors.)

And, they had at least one more thing in common. They knew that in this life, there is no such thing as spiritual neutrality. When we ultimately stand before the throne of our Creator, it will not suffice to say, “Well, I didn’t do anything truly evil.”

In a moment we will listen to Dylan’s ballad about the choice before us. First, though, consider how Lewis uses the imagery of the war engulfing the world in the 1940s to describe this truth.

Why is God landing in this enemy-occupied world in disguise and starting a sort of secret society to undermine the devil? Why is He not landing in force, invading it? Is it that He is not strong enough? Well, Christians think He is going to land in force; we do not know when. But we can guess why He is delaying. He wants to give us the chance of joining His side freely. I do not suppose you and I would have thought much of a Frenchman who waited till the Allies were marching into Germany and then announced he was on our side.

God will invade. But I wonder whether people who ask God to interfere openly and directly in our world quite realize what it will be like when He does. When that happens, it is the end of the world.

When the author walks on to the stage the play is over. God is going to invade, all right: but what is the good of saying you are on His side then, when you see the whole natural universe melting away like a dream and something else—something it never entered your head to conceive—comes crashing in; something so beautiful to some of us and so terrible to others that none of us will have any choice left? For this time it will be God without disguise; something so overwhelming that it will strike either irresistible love or irresistible horror into every creature.

It will be too late then to choose your side. There is no use saying you choose to lie down when it has become impossible to stand up. That will not be the time for choosing; it will be the time when we discover which side we really have chosen, whether we realized it before or not. Now, today, this moment, is our chance to choose the right side. God is holding back to give us that chance. It will not last forever. We must take it or leave it. (Mere Christianity).

Now, as promised, “Gotta Serve Somebody.”

_____

*You can read the entire interview in the current issue of AARP The Magazine, available here.

Engage Brain

On By robstroudIn C.S. Lewis, Education, Potentially Useful Trivia, The Future18 Comments

brainsWhen I attended the University of Washington, we had to learn the old-fashioned way—by studying. Now they are anticipating downloading information directly into students’ brains.

Literal brain dumps are actually still in the future . . . but researchers have documented the first indisputable brain-to-brain interface between humans!

My first paragraph is not an exaggeration of what researchers think may one day happen.

The project could also eventually lead to “brain tutoring,” in which knowledge is transferred directly from the brain of a teacher to a student.

The student would view this shortcut as advantageous. (It could also save a great deal in tuition expenses, if each course only took, say, an hour or two of brain interfacing.)

The university sees another advantage—circumventing limited teaching skills.

“Imagine someone who’s a brilliant scientist but not a brilliant teacher. Complex knowledge is hard to explain – we’re limited by language,” said co-author Chantel Prat, a faculty member at the Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences and a UW assistant professor of psychology.

My main question is, what will the teacher do, once their knowledge has been transferred to a student?

Presumably they will be able to retain a semblance of their knowledge, unlike the experience of the unfortunate Orbanians. They rely on a nanite technology, and it leaves the brilliant brain in a childlike state after the knowledge is siphoned out of it. You can learn more about them in “Learning Curve,” a documentary about the Stargate project.

C.S. Lewis had a great deal to say about education. He was a popular professor, despite the fact many of his students were intimidated by his brilliance. It is possible that if his students were able to download his knowledge, it might have caused their crania to explode.

In one essay, Lewis explains the differences between education and training, declaring “If education is beaten by training, civilization dies.” (“Our English Syllabus”).

Lewis continues, arguing that learning itself, is something distinct. It is not marked by a transfer of knowledge, but by a hunger to grow.

Now learning, considered in itself, has, on my view, no connexion at all with education. It is an activity for . . . all [who] desire to know. . . .

Societies have usually held a belief . . . that knowledge is the natural food of the human mind: that those who specially pursue it are being specially human; and that their activity is good in itself besides being always honourable and sometimes useful to the whole society.

Oh, and if you are waiting to “learn” when they can download knowledge directly into your skull, consider this wise advice from Lewis.

The only people who achieve much are those who want knowledge so badly that they seek it while the conditions are still unfavourable. (“Learning in Wartime”).

_____

The picture above shows two UW guinea pigs transferring brain waves to one another. (I am uncertain whether two-way transfer is already possible, or if one brain is forced to serve in a receptacle role.)

The article announcing the results can be seen here.

Martian Tribute to C.S. Lewis

On By robstroudIn Books, C.S. Lewis, Education, Modern Life, Nature16 Comments

Malacandra CraterMere Inkling recently named a crater on Mars, in honor of C.S. Lewis. The crater’s name is Malacandra, which was the name for the red planet in the first volume of Lewis’ Space Trilogy, Out of the Silent Planet.

The naming of Malacandra Crater was done through an organization preparing the map which will be used by the Mars One Mission. Mars One is the optimistic international effort to establish a permanent human settlement on the red planet, beginning in 2024.

The über-adventurous (or foolhardy) are able to apply today for consideration to become an astronaut.

The crater naming project is not sponsored by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). Instead, it is coordinated by Uwingu, a for profit company that has a goal of raising $10,000,000 for grants to scientists and educators promoting space exploration.

Due to its limited* budget, Mere Inkling was only able to name a small crater. However, it’s not the expense, it’s the thought that counts.

In addition to Malacandra Crater, I named the impact mark directly to its south in honor of my grandchildren. The process allows one to include a dedication for each named crater. For theirs, I wrote:

Stroud Crater is named in honor of the brilliant grandchildren of Rob & Delores Stroud. Andrew, Ariana, Dominic, Arabelle, Rachel, Rebecca, Kaelyn & Asher. Whether they grow up to be astrophysicists, veterinarians or educators, we know they will all make this world a better place. Soli Deo Gloria.

The tiny basins named above lie in Aurorae Chaos. It’s a rugged neighborhood, but there are surprisingly few craters in the immediate vicinity. I’m always seeking opportunities to encourage my grandchildren to study science, and I hope this will pique their interests, both now and in the years to come.

C.S. Lewis is not primarily known today as a writer of science fiction, but his series (also known as the Cosmic Trilogy, or the Ransom Trilogy, after its protagonist) is quite good. In fact, it was the very first of Lewis’ works I ever read. I was introduced to them by a Christian friend during my college years.

Several influences converged to move Lewis to venture into science fiction. In 1938, he thanked a friend for his praise of Out of the Silent Planet, and wrote:

You are obviously much better informed than I about this type of literature and the only one I can add to your list is Voyage to Arcturus by David Lyndsay (Methuen) which is out of print but a good bookseller will probably get you a copy for about 5 to 6 shillings. It is entirely on the imaginative and not at all on the scientific wing.

What immediately spurred me to write was Olaf Stapledon’s Last and First Men and an essay in J. B. S. Haldane’s Possible Worlds both of which seemed to take the idea of such travel seriously and to have the desperately immoral outlook which I try to pillory in Weston.

I like the whole interplanetary idea as a mythology and simply wished to conquer for my own (Christian) point of view what has always hitherto been used by the opposite side. I think Wells’ 1st Men in the Moon the best of the sort I have read.**

Lewis then appends a comment referring to the other planets in our solar system, but intriguing in light of the recent discovery of numerous planets throughout the galaxy. “The more astronomy we know the less likely it seems that other planets are inhabited: even Mars has practically no oxygen.”

One of Lewis often overlooked science fiction short stories, “Ministering Angels,” is set on Mars. It begins in the following way.

The Monk, as they called him, settled himself on the camp chair beside his bunk and stared through the window at the harsh sand and black-blue sky of Mars. He did not mean to begin his ‘work’ for ten minutes yet. Not, of course, the work he had been brought there to do. He was the meteorologist of the party, and his work in that capacity was largely done; he had found out whatever could be found out.

There was nothing more, within the limited radius he could investigate, to be observed for at least twenty-five days. And meteorology had not been his real motive. He had chosen three years on Mars as the nearest modern equivalent to a hermitage in the desert.

He had come there to meditate: to continue the slow, perpetual rebuilding of that inner structure which, in his view, it was the main purpose of life to rebuild. And now his ten minutes’ rest was over. He began with his well-used formula. ‘Gentle and patient Master, teach me to need men less and to love thee more.’ Then to it. There was no time to waste.

There were barely six months of this lifeless, sinless, unsuffering wilderness ahead of him. Three years were short . . . but when the shout came he rose out of his chair with the practised alertness of a sailor.

The Botanist in the next cabin responded to the same shout with a curse. His eye had been at the microscope when it came. It was maddening. Constant interruption. A man might as well try to work in the middle of Piccadilly as in this infernal camp. And his work was already a race against time. Six months more . . . and he had hardly begun.

The flora of Mars, these tiny, miraculously hardy organisms, the ingenuity of their contrivances to live under all but impossible conditions—it was a feast for a lifetime. He would ignore the shout. But then came the bell. All hands to the main room.
(“Ministering Angels,” Of Other Worlds: Essays and Stories).

Malacandra Crater may be a small feature on a vast and curious planet, but it is a tribute to an author of immense and lasting talent.

_____

* i.e. nonexistent

** The following titles mentioned by Lewis are available for free digital download:

Voyage to Arcturus

Last and First Men

The First Men in the Moon

Deadly Gargoyles

On By robstroudIn C.S. Lewis, The Medieval Church16 Comments

gargoyle magdalenWhoever first considered gargoyles an attractive addition to buildings, must have had an odd personality. I have never developed an appreciation them.

What’s worse is when moonstruck (lunatic) architects deem gargoyles suitable for adorning churches.

There are too many examples out there to count. I am sure there are a number of websites devoted to them. But I don’t care enough to investigate.

It is one thing to shape a natural or fantastical creature to use as a rain spout on a building. Quite another, in my opinion, to opt for a grotesquery.

Churches should stick with symbolism that edifies the people. Admittedly, this can include some potentially gruesome subject, such as images of martyrdoms.

Our familiarity with the crucifix itself has dulled the impact of its terrible agony. We often fail to recognize the magnitude of the suffering Jesus endured.

Gargoyles were in the news this week. The reason for their appearance gave the title to this column.

A tragedy occurred in Chicago when a gargoyle broke free from a dated building and struck an innocent pedestrian. She was killed almost immediately by the crushing blow.

To make matters even more sad, the building from which the “ornament” fell was a church.

Second Presbyterian Church was built in 1874 and is a national historic landmark. Local news outlets report that it failed various inspections between 2007 and 2011, but passed them in 2012 and 2013. (The picture above is not of the gargoyle in question.)

Sarah was the name of the victim of this tragic accident. I invite your prayers on behalf of this young woman’s loved ones, especially her two children.

I think so little of church gargoyles that I included the subject in an as yet unpublished book set in the medieval period.

The nightmare gargoyle pictured on the top of the page adorns Magdalen College in Oxford. It was established in 1458, and was the school where C.S. Lewis began his teaching career.

In C.S. Lewis: An Examined Life, Bruce Edwards writes, “The college is noted for its wealth of gargoyles, grotesques, and stone portraits of notable people.”

Well, the college may be named after Mary Magdalene, but at least it isn’t a church. As for the stone “portraits,” they sound like a very agreeable adornment.

As lovely as Magdalen is considered to be, on the whole Lewis considered Cambridge University more appealing than Oxford. In a 1954 letter he wrote, “I’m afraid one must admit that, architecturally, Cambridge beats Oxford; there is so much more variety in Cambridge.”

In two other letters written the same year, Lewis revealed that there was much more to his new academic post than mere architecture that appealed to him. Oxford had taken Lewis for granted, and often belittled him because of his simplistic trust in Christ.

You know I am going as a Professor to Cambridge? My new college is Magdalene, Cambridge: a tiny little place compared with this, but a perfect gem architecturally and (I think) much more congenial socially & spiritually.

Did I tell you I’ve been made a professor at Cambridge? I take up my duties on Jan. 1st at Magdalene College, Cambridge (Eng.). Note the difference in spelling. It means rather less work for rather more pay. And I think I shall like Magdalene better than Magdalen. It’s a tiny college (a perfect cameo architecturally) and they’re so old fashioned, & pious, & gentle and conservative– unlike this leftist, atheist, cynical, hard-boiled, huge Magdalen. Perhaps from being the fogey and ‘old woman’ here I shall become the enfant terrible there.

It is not about architecture at all—or the presence or absence of grotesqueries. It is about finding a home where you know you are welcome and appreciated. A place where you do not need to remain constantly on your guard, because there are colleagues present who desire to see you humbled.

It is good to know C.S. Lewis spent the final years of his teaching life in an academic family that truly appreciated the gifted scholar in their midst.

Really Creative Writing

On By robstroudIn Advice to Writers, C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Literature, Narnia, Writing20 Comments

father christmasWhen did you first learn how to express yourself creatively? Some of us were blessed with parents who recognized the importance of things like music, art and literature. Others, alas, were not.

Most readers of Mere Inkling like to dabble in writing themselves. Many are quite skilled, and disciplined enough to persist with the demanding task of regularly composing interesting pieces for their own online columns. Some, in fact, are quite accomplished and successful in their personal literary efforts.

Becoming a good, truly good, writer requires experience. One may be born with the innate ability to become a Shakespeare or a Hemingway, but the skills need to be sharpened through effort. Study often helps, but it can never replace the necessity of practice in honing our writing.

It seems to me that the sooner we begin the process of unbridling our imaginations, translating our visions into words, and writing it all down in a way that engages the imaginings of others, the better we can become.

Many of you, especially Europeans, will be familiar with a gaming product that arose in the United Kingdom. They are called Top Trumps, and the cards come in a wide variety of themes. One set that I own is Narnia, from which the image at the top of this page comes.

Tolkien fans will be delighted to learn they just reissued a Lord of the Rings set that comes in an amazing Eye of Sauron tin. You can learn more about that unique item here.

It was while thinking about my Narnia cards when I got the idea to see if there was an online mechanism for making one’s own playing cards. I was toying with the idea of fashioning a C.S. Lewis card to illustrate one of my posts.

I was actually searching online for a site where I could “create” such a card. I found several. Only later did I consider the irony of using that particular word.

For theologians, the word create bears profound significance. When it comes to the human activity of bringing together in some novel shape pre-existing images or ideas, it is not truly accurate. Lewis wrote about that in a 1943 letter to Sister Penelope.

‘Creation’ as applied to human authorship . . . seems to me an entirely misleading term. We . . . re-arrange elements He has provided. There is not a vestige of real creativity de novo in us. Try to imagine a new primary colour, a third sex, a fourth dimension, or even a monster which does not consist of bits of existing animals stuck together! Nothing happens.

And that surely is why our works (as you said) never mean to others quite what we intended: because we are re-combining elements made by Him and already containing His meanings. Because of those divine meanings in our materials it is impossible we should ever know the whole meaning of our own works, and the meaning we never intended may be the best and truest one.

Writing a book is much less like creation than it is like planting a garden or begetting a child: in all three cases we are only entering as one cause into a causal stream which works, so to speak, in its own way. I would not wish it to be otherwise.

Still, even though we are not true “creators,” it is enjoyable to rearrange the mundane elements (or words) of this life in fresh ways.

That’s one reason I was pleased to discover a website devoted to offering a “Trading Card Creator” hosted by the International Reading Association. It “gives students an alternative way to demonstrate their literacy knowledge and skill when writing about popular culture texts or real world examples.”
Why didn’t they have cool stuff like this when I was growing up? (If they did, I might be able to express myself better than by having to rely on phrases like “cool stuff.”)

Below you will find their website, along with a second option. I was thinking that my grandchildren might find it interesting to create a set of cards about our family tree. Their own sketches could be used for ancestors for whom we have no photograph. The comprehensive trading card creator maker offers a variety of templates, including for people, places, events and objects.

The template offered by the second site is generic enough that the cards can be produced in similar categories.

Unleash your imagination. And, after you’ve had some fun, consider sharing these links with a child you may know.

ReadWriteThink Trading Cards

Big Huge Labs Trading Cards

C.S. Lewis Card 3C.S. Lewis Card 2C.S. Lewis Card 1C.S. Lewis Card 4