About Someone Else Who Died November 22, 1963
Another major figure of the 20th Century also
died on November 22, 1963. His name is
C.S. Lewis. As yesterday's Christian
Science Monitor noted, Lewis's passing was far overshadowed by JFK's assassination
and few people paid attention.[1] The
Gospel Coalition website[2] explains that Lewis collapsed and died at his home in
Oxford early that evening, apparently just an hour or so before Kennedy was
shot.
The Episcopal Church does pay attention today, though, and since
2003 has remembered Lewis in its calendar of Lesser Feasts and Fasts. The commentary there highlights the fact that
Lewis did not come by his religion easily, but went through a long period of
atheism from his adolescence in the 1910s until 1929. The profile also notes that his reconversion,
fulfilled in 1931, "inaugurated a wonderful outpouring of Christian
apologetics in media as varied as popular theology, children’s literature,
fantasy and science fiction, and correspondence on spiritual matters with
friends and strangers alike."
Here are a few quotes from Lewis, taken from a variety of
his writings and assorted websites:
"I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun
has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else."
As we copied-and-pasted those words a little while ago, we
didn't know, but quickly learned, that they now appear on the plaque which just
yesterday was dedicated to Lewis in Poet's Corner in Westminster Abbey.[3]
Some other of Lewis's words:
"Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form
of every virtue at the testing point."
"If you look for truth, you may find comfort in the
end; if you look for comfort you will not get either comfort or truth only soft
soap and wishful thinking to begin, and in the end, despair."
"Whatever men expect, they soon come to think they have
a right to: the sense of disappointment can, with very little skill on (the
devil's) part, be turned into a sense of injury."
"You cannot make men good by law: and without good men
you cannot have a good society."
“Each new power won by man is a power over man as well. Each
advance leaves him weaker as well as stronger.”
"Friendship is born at that moment when one person says
to another: What! You too? I thought I was the only one."
"Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. Aim at
earth and you get neither."
"The trouble about trying to make yourself stupider
than you really are is that you very often succeed."
And here is the Collect for this Day in Lesser Feasts and
Fasts, 2006 (page 465):
O God of searing truth and surpassing beauty, we give you thanks for Clive Staples Lewis, whose sanctified imagination lights fires of faith in young and old alike. Surprise us also with your joy and draw us into that new and abundant life which is ours in Christ Jesus, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
Finally, one other notable also passed away that day: Aldous
Huxley, aged 69, died of cancer in Los Angeles at 5:20PM PST, seven hours after
Kennedy's shooting and eight hours after Lewis's death in England.[4]
-----------------------------------
[3] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10452711/Does-CS-Lewis-deserve-a-place-in-Poets-Corner.html. Also see an interview with Lewis's stepson
Douglas Gresham (Joy Davidman's son), here: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/features/cs-lewis-in-the-shadow-of-jfks-death-8955470.html. Other Telegraph stories note that Rowan
Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury, officiated at the unveiling of the
Poet's Corner plaque.
Labels: Christianity, Episcopal Church, People, World
posted by Carol S. | 11/23/2013 06:05:00 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home