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I had thought I had read this book before

Revisado: 05-15-23

I just finished listening to an audio version of C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces. I had thought I had read this book before. I have it on my shelf at home in Canada. Indeed, I know I've done a sort of reading of it at two different times before in my life when I was younger. But now at 73, after listening to the full audio version, I see that my previous readings were not complete. I see that I must have skimmed a lot of it. Indeed, I think a regular visual reading would have caused me much more burden than an audio reading which I could do while walking. I’m amazed at this book. I began reading the Greeks as a teenager. I have read almost everything that is published in English translation from the age of Plato and Aristotle and before. I have been reading literature, philosophy, history, psychology, the sciences, and not least theology for most of my life. Yet, upon finishing this novel, I see that my understanding is pitiably still at kindergarten level. I can only in conclusion repeat to my own heart the wisdom of Deuteronomy 29:29.

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A challenge to our present culture

Revisado: 03-29-23

William Law's, "A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life", is a challenge to our present culture. This is a truly amazing book. I've never heard the arguments for a Christian life presented so comprehensively and clearly. It is a no nonsesne call to spiritual formation. Some of Law's terms are dated and difficult to accept and understand in our present culture because of the change in the meaning and connotation of words and changes in social attitudes. However, the basic arguments are powerful and encouraging to take seriously that which we have lost the vision to take seriously. Law was willing to face things as they are and take his faith very seriously. That's something that few in our culture have the stomach for. It is a call to return to something we have lost.
I've been reading spiritual transformation books for the past year, and this book makes all that I've read so far of the contemporary spiritual transformation books seem like froth in an overly shaken milkshake, mostly air bubbles and little milk. Law’s book is amazingly and incomparably solid in content, seriousness and earnestness. Definitely worth reading by present day disciples.

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Thank you!

Revisado: 12-31-22

I've just finished audio reading the new book by Bono of U2 called “Surrender” (2022). I’m very moved. When I began the book I expected to gain some knowledge and insight into the culture of our times. I hoped to understand better the forces and movements of our times, those influencing my peers and my children. I hoped to find some common language with my son and daughter, and perhaps also with my grandchildren. I hoped to get some new understanding of God and how God works through other people. Yes, all of this and more. But I found much more than this. I found a person, Bono. I found a person I could really love as a friend. That is amazing! Thank you Bono. Even though You don’t know me, I have been deeply moved by your genius of insight, communication, and love for others in many forms. You are a great man. I cannot express the effect you have had on me through this reading. I thank you for it. May God bless you and your family and those who are touched by your message. I believe you point to a better way to live and a better way to understand God with us.

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As the doom of the Western world draws to evening

Revisado: 11-12-22

The Silmarillion by JRR Tolkien is an amazing book! The narrator Martin Shaw does beautifully with the pronunciation of the many ancient names in ancient languages. He subtly acts out the story with his voice.
Tolkien imagines the story of the Creation and of the development of the earth in times whose histories we have lost. It presents a depth to what really must have been the history of ancient man in those times which are beyond us, and only available through myth. Tolkien presents the story in the language and mythology which relates to the ancient myths of the Western world. He mingles the ancient Germanic, Celtic, and Graeco-Roman spiritual world in a framework set into a Christian worldview framework. Being British, he has also been influenced in his imagination by the mythologies of the Eastern spiritual world, as from China and India, as well as from the Muslim and African worldviews. His cosmology is complex indeed, and it is a myth created as the doom of the Western world draws to evening. How strange that the greatest writings seem to come at the ends of great ages, and the most beautiful, though sad, flowers of a culture emerge when that culture is already disappearing from the world. I plan to read this book again. It stirs the imagination far beyond what we have known, yet in a healthy and potentially fruitful direction.

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Plan to read it again

Revisado: 10-18-22

Both a good book for introducing life giving values to children and also an deeply insightful study in human nature. I deeply respect this author's work. It is so exciting and entertaining, and at the same time ennobling. The author is not only entertainer but acts as a mentor and teacher, using his gift to powerfully teach Christian values.

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Very helpful for getting insight into our times

Revisado: 10-18-22

This is amother amazing book by Lewis. It is very insightful on a number of intellectual but commonly relevant topics. Very helpful for getting insight into our timesI I need to read it again to follow the arguments more clearly. It makes me wish I had taken up the academic life. Lewis makes thinking and study seem so enjoyable and leisurely. That these thoughts come from about 100 years ago reminds us that people have been facing the same problems we face now for a long time already, and things take much longer to develop and mature than we imagine, certainly more than our lifetimes. That reminds us also that what we do here and now, what we teach, during our lifetime has powerful effect on future ages.

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Reflections after reading the book

Revisado: 02-06-22

Just finished reading G. K. Chesterton’s book “Heretics”. What a genius he was. I am overwhelmed beyond expression. If ever I wanted to write books, this is the type of thing I have longed to write. I thought that the only way to communicate to our society in a way that they would accept and consider would be to write satire or comedy. But today after finishing this second book of Chesterton and today also listening to an excerpt of a film made by Charlie Chaplain at the beginning of the second world war satirizing Adolf Hitler, and which even Hitler himself watched twice, and to see that all of Chesterton’s brilliance and his stunning observations on the follies of modern thinking, and his defence of Christianity and to see Chaplin’s brilliant humour, who was the greatest comedian of the century and a man equally well known as Hitler himself, and to see that these two giants had so little impact on the trajectory of civilization, brings me almost into despair. Another observation I make from reading Chesterton is that I am just an ordinary bloke. When I see this man’s brilliance I realize that there is nothing special about me, and that I stand among giants and did not realize it in my foolishness. And I come to a new level of seeing myself before God, and I wonder that I am such a fool, but only see it with 72 years of age. Perhaps, if I had realized what a fool I am, I would never even have attempted to do a PhD. What I realize from Chesterton and Chaplin is that the greatest efforts of mankind will not raise them up to greatness in the sense that they can bring us salvation. And even the greatest of them is a fool, and none of them are worthy to be followed as our God. If I will always be a fool, and if my visions are always to be delusions, what am I to live for? I live for Christ.
I would have given this book a full rating but the narrator, though very brilliant in ability, read too fast and always gave me that feeling that he was rushing through the reading, thereby detracting from the amazing profundity of what he was reading.

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