C. S. Lewis and Defending the Faith (part four)

In 1945, C. S. Lewis was invited to address a gathering of Welsh Anglican priests and youth workers on the subject of Christian apologetics. Here are his remarks, published in the book, God in the Dock, and, as needed, some commentary on them.

From this there follows a corollary about the apologist’s private reading. There are two questions he will naturally ask himself. (1) have I been ”keeping up,” keeping abreast of recent movements in theology? (2) Have I stood firm (super monstratas vias [superbly shown ways, or ways that have been tested]) amid all these “winds of doctrine”? I want to say emphatically that the second question is far the more important of the two. Our upbringing and the whole atmosphere of the world we live in make it certain that our main temptation will be that of yielding to winds of doctrine, not that of ignoring them. We are not at all likely to be hidebound [unwilling or unable to change]; we are very likely to be the slaves of fashion. If one has to choose between reading the new books and reading the old, one must chose the old: not because they are necessarily better but because they contain precisely those truths of which our own age is neglectful. The standard of permanent Christianity must be kept clear in our minds and it is against that standard that we must test all contemporary thought. In fact, we must at all costs not move with the times. We serve One who said “Heaven and Earth shall move with the times, but my words shall not move with the times.”

Lewis now calls “original” Christianity, “permanent” Christianity. And it is permanent Christianity which has been unacceptable to human wisdom from the very beginning, and that has prompted each generation to look for alternate explanations. Early on it was Gnosticism, then various forms of syncretism, then ecclesiastical dogmatism, then liberalism, and then secularism. Defenders of the faith are not to yield to these powerful winds of human origin.

But Lewis would certainly not ask the apologist/defender of the faith to neglect the new books that offer various winds of doctrine, because that is how we learn the new attacks on the old faith. And that is how we clarify the gospel and protect those who might fall susceptible to these new books. It is not so different from reading the new science developments.

I am speaking, so far, of theological reading. Scientific reading is a different matter. If you know any science it is very desirable that you should keep it up. We have to answer the current scientific attitude toward Christianity, not the attitude scientists adopted one hundred years ago. Science is in continual change and we must try to keep abreast of it. We may mention such things; but we must mention them lightly and without claiming that they are more than “interesting.” Sentences beginning “Science has now proved” should be avoided. If we try to base our apologetic on some recent development in science, we shall usually find that just as we have put the finishing touches to our argument science has changed its mind and quietly withdrawn the theory we have been using as our foundation stone. Timeo Dananos e dona ferentes[I fear the Greeks even when they bear gifts] is a sound principle.

Science findings may or may not support Biblical teaching. This is why we should treat them as Trojan horses that might actually undermine the faith. They may seem like gifts, but might indeed be dangerous. Lewis’s warning about the changing tides of scientific discovery should be heeded. Some new scientific discoveries spark ethical concerns (for example, cloning and gene splicing), and this might lead to an apologetic response. Not everything we can do should be done.