The other evening I watched a programme on the tv about CS Lewis, the author of the Lion the Witch and Wardrobe. I had also seen the play Shadowlands about his life and marriage and the tragic death of his wife.
CS Lewis was a theologian and a Christian - the story of the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe is a parody on the life of Jesus.
The programme told the story of his life - as if through his own eyes - how he had this wonderful idyllic childhood - until his mother died in her forties and he was sent away to boarding school. How he went to Oxford and then to the trenches during the First World War and all that time a confirmed atheist
Back at Oxford he seemed to cave in to the pressure of his Christian friends and became a Christian. He talked about the exhilarating feeling of having this special relationship with God - the special understanding of why Jesus died for him - until
...until his wife became very ill with cancer and eventually died. Then his faith deserted him. He was angry with his God and felt let down. He spoke about how he withdrew from life - would have nothing to do with his family or his wife’s young children from her former marriage but who were living with them.
I was quite surprised at his reaction - surely if you trust your God so implicitly and you believe that you have such a personal and ‘one to one’ relationship with him (CS Lewis believed God was a he) - surely you should be able to ride all the storms that come along.
I was also surprised at the extent of his grief and loss - with the kind of Christian belief he had, and would there not be a feeling that death was not such a final curtain but a transition of the soul to heaven?
It is easy to discuss the impact this tragedy had on his faith and discuss how he should have reacted but it is also legitimate to also discuss the role of God.
What can we say about God in this situation? Did he really love CS Lewis and his family - or were they expendable.
Was this part of a punishment for them for having offended God in some way.
Did they suffer as part of some larger divine plan that they were unaware of?
All these arguments are set out in the Book of Job. I was brought up thinking that the story of Job was all about his faith enduring in spite of his suffering. Not at all. It is a composite poem about mankind's relationship with God.
The first world war was a turning point for the Christian religion. God lost credibility in that horror and its awful aftermath. More people turned away from the Christian religion - especially in this country and they found that they could live without it.
Science too was making vast advances and the literal translation of the Bible, especially the creation story was more and more seen to be no more than a story
Science and religion diverged because they seemed incompatible
Hence we now have arguments such as those presented by Richard Dawkins who totally separates religion from science. God is denounced and religion is shown as offering nothing but violence and suffering to the world. Throw your lot in with scientific discovery to make a better world.
All this because there is something of a civil war going on between religion and science - maybe not as apparent in this country but certainly in America.
In America the christian religious movement is very powerful and some are demanding that education retains the biblical tradition as a truth - they want only the biblical tradition of Genesis taught in schools as the truth.
A compromise being worked out is to keep the christian religion at the heart of education by saying that the universe is controlled by intelligent design - that God is permanently active - releasing knowledge to human kind at a rate that God determines.
I think Unitarians find it amazing that such a conflict of ideals should exist.
If everyone was so certain about the existence of God then this church would be full. If it was certain that there was no God at all and that all human progress was down to the discoveries of science then this church would have been empty since the last century.
The truth is that religion does play a part in many people’s lives but it is also true that many people are happy to live without it.
It is also true that science never finds its goal. The unravelling of one mystery creates a gateway to another. ‘The more we learn, the less we know’
It is possible for religion and science to go together but not as before.
Religion cannot lock it self into the past and say that there can be no new knowledge - that all was revealed many ages ago and cannot be changed.
Religion cannot continually look backwards and promote only its own story as history nor rely on the claim that its authority is based on events where the laws of nature were suspended - where the sun stood still or there was a virgin birth or there was a physical resuurec tion.
Religion cannot claim that its truth is the only truth and that those who question or disbelieve that truth are outcasts.
What religion can offer is the wisdom and experience of ages if people are allowed to look. Religion can offer a moral code which is good for society. Religion can help a person reach an understanding about themselves - what their place is in the great universe. How they should relate to the rest of the world.
We need to teach our children about our religion and our values and if they question them and later reject them then that is part of their process of discovery. We cannot lock them into a religion that has no meaning or significance for the 21st century.
Religion should empower their thinking not constrict it. Religion should help our children to understand the holiness of nature and the miracles of life that are real.
I was reading ann article in the Booklet published this by the National Unitarian Fellowship under the title Heart and Soul.
The article by Henry Crompton discusses these issues and in it he talks about the tensions that exist throughout the natural world and throughout all science.
The new born star contains a tension between the force of gravity holding all its matter together and the forces of thermal and magnetic radiation trying to disintegrate it in a massive explosion.
In all life, there is alwaays a creative force in tension with a destructive one. Build a house and one day it will fall down, create an empire and one day it will be no more. Our bodies grow, we grow in wisdom but also age. Everything has to exist in tension with its opposing force
And yet within all the tensions there is a creative force at work. Quite unexplainable. Quite mysterious. The force that makes the flower grow or gives the child its character. The force that sets the star in motion.
Humankind seems quite unable to deal with the tensions that exist in the world we live in.
We try to resolve the tensions by confrontation - taking one side or the other and polarising the tensionss and often resolving the differences by violence .. Christianity dealt with the tension of growing knowledge by burning its questioners at the stake.
Tensions between political ideologies are settled by violent wars. Tensions created by lack of finite resources such as water or oil also lead to war.
How do we deal with the tensions in our personal lives or in our communities? Usually by going to one side or the other.
Henry Crompton said that people must learn to live WITH the tension. Be able to live within it. It is part of the creative flow of that force that makes the flower grow and the star come to life.
To always be aware of both sides of the tension.
True religion is accepting the mystery of that creative force and flowing with it because we are all part of it.
True religion is being part of all life, and celebrating it should also be part of life. If this creative force is God, then we are part of God and part of God’s purpose.
As Unitarians we should not be struggling with tensions but living with them, living within them. The religious life is not about holding on to the past nor denying the future - but living in such a way that both are part of the creative process.
All should be moving forward. Moving towards that goal of peace and plenty for all - part of the creative force of life - the essence of God.
It is not so much that we have a personal relationship with our own personal God - as CS Lewis had - but that we have a personal relationship with God as life, the mysterious creative force that is the soul of the universe.
Amen
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