John Runciman, King Lear in the Storm, 1767 Act III of Shakespeare's King Lear gets to me every time. Lear, spectacularly blinded by pride and bereft of power in his old age, having foolishly exiled one daughter and exposed himself to betrayal by the other two, retreats into a storm with his Fool and descends into madness, shaking his fist at nature, railing, “Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! Rage! Blow!” … [Read more...] about “Your crooked heart”: Literary Study and Spiritual Formation (Scholar’s Call)
C. S. Lewis
Vocatio Christ: The Contours of Our Callings Part 2 (Scholar’s Compass)
Quotation Excerpts from Learning in Wartime, by C. S. Lewis, woven throughout post. Reflection In my last post I argued that so long as Christians' talk about “finding one's calling” is held captive by the modern American idea that self-realization only happens by way of unfettered, individual self-expression, our talk of vocation will be far-removed from Christ's call to live lives of self-sacrificial love. This way of thinking about vocation is inherently self-absorbed and will, more often than not, be blind to our … [Read more...] about Vocatio Christ: The Contours of Our Callings Part 2 (Scholar’s Compass)
Book Review: Is Your Lord Large Enough?
Is Your Lord Large Enough? How C. S. Lewis Expands Our View of God. Peter J. Schakel. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2008. Summary: This book looks at the contribution Lewis made, particularly through the way his books engage the imagination, to the spiritual formation of Christians, exploring a number of the matters crucial to their growth in Christ. Peter J. Schakel has written a number of fine books on C.S. Lewis including one on Till We Have Faces (Reason and Imagination in C.S. Lewis: A Study of … [Read more...] about Book Review: Is Your Lord Large Enough?
Risky Love
Loving anyone is a risky thing. In fact, we could argue that “love is never seized apart from courage.” When we make ourselves vulnerable, we could get hurt. Lewis knew about the pain of loving. He lost his mother when he was about nine years old. He lost a close friend that he fought with in World War I—Paddy Moore. He lost his father and last but by no means least, his beloved wife, Joy, to cancer. Lewis nevertheless says about love: To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly … [Read more...] about Risky Love
Cur Deus Homo. An Advent Devotional
In the eleventh century, Anselm and theologians like him began to interact with a larger world of ideas, specifically the Muslim theologians who were challenging some of the central tenets of the Christian faith. In the centuries previous, theology had largely been an increasingly ad intra discussion among the theologians of Christendom. As Muslim writings (and even the occasional Muslim thinker) began their movement into Europe, they began to challenge theological positions which had been taken for granted. It is in … [Read more...] about Cur Deus Homo. An Advent Devotional