C.S. Lewis: Subversive Protestant

In this brief letter[i] (written in Latin) to a Roman Catholic Priest, C.S. Lewis appeals to (or at least hints at): (1) heart conversion/piety, (2) justification by faith alone, (3) the priesthood of all believers, (4) assurance of faith, (5) and the sufficiency of Christ’s atonement.  Only Clive, my friends!

From the College of St. Mary Magdalen

Oxford

26^th December

St. Stephen’s Day, 1951

Dearest Father,

Thank you for the letter which I have received from you today and I invoke upon you all spiritual and temporal blessings in the Lord.

As for myself, during the past year a great joy has befallen me. Difficult though it is, I shall try to explain this in words.

It is astonishing that sometimes we believe that we believe what, really, in our heart, we do not believe.

For a long time I believed that I believed in the forgiveness of sins. But suddenly (on St. Mark’s day) this truth appeared in my mind so clear a light that I perceived than never before (and that after many confessions and absolutions) had I believed it with my whole heart.

So great is the difference between mere affirmation by the intellect and that faith, fixed in the very marrow and as it were palpable, which the apostle wrote was substance.

Perhaps I was granted this deliverance in response to your intercessions on my behalf.

This emboldens me to say to you something that a layman ought scarcely to say to a priest nor a junior to a senior. (On the other hand, out of the mouths of babes: indeed, as once to Balaam, out of the mouth of an ass!)

It is this: you write much about your own sins. Beware (permit me, my dearest Father, to say beware) lest humility should pass over into anxiety or sadness. It is bidden us to ‘rejoice and always rejoice.” Jesus has cancelled the handwriting which was against us. Lift up our hearts!

Permit me, I pray you, these stammerings. You are ever in my prayers and every will be.

Farewell,

C.S. Lewis