The daily readings by C.S. Lewis are quite thought provoking. I have to read each entry a couple times to really get my head around what he means. He works so hard at trying to make sense of Christianity in such a detailed way. Details tends to be what Theology is all about but over the last few years I have been reading a lot of new age books and thinking in a detailed way about pastoral theology not systematic theology. I find systematic theology less practical and less important however I am waiting to be surprised one of these days.
While I am learning many things in this class, I wanted to write about Lewis’s daily reading entitled ” The Context of Freedom” from September 11. Here Lewis explores the purpose of consciousness and posits that the Trinity and the different forms of love bring us contrast in knowing ourselves. Contrast brings consciousness and then ultimately freedom.
Lewis’s theory has been confusing me in the context of new age theology. At least from reading the “Power of Now” which is all about consciousness, I understand that consciousness brings us to the moment, brings us into our pain body, it heals us, among others things which then leads to an internal freedom. But I am not certain that the trinity or different forms of love are really the key elements of contrast that bring freedom. We have many contrasts in our lives which bring freedom and I find Christianity very weak as far as a religion goes in the realm of contrasts.
I think Lewis’ argument against theism lends itself more to supporting polytheism rather than Christianity. For example in Hinduism, the many god’s have different personalities and images would bring more contrast to our understanding of God and ourselves and by his theory bring more fodder for choice and then freedom.
We live in a society where it is all about choices (which perhaps was adopted from Christianity). However I would argue that we have too many choices which brings anxiety for many people. I spent some time in India and was interested to see how contented people were with such limited choices in their lives. Sometimes less choices can bring comfort, consistency, and predictability.
The other thought I had about consciousness was about how the skill of observation tha can bring consciousness. I was reading the book “Relational Tri-Umph” last night by Gerry M. Goertzen who explained that the process of observation is a healthy skill to bring a person consciousness when a situation or crisis arises in a persons life. If a person can step out of the situation in a healthy way and just see what is going on, then they can make better decisions instead of being emotionally triggered. Even though Goertzen comes from a Christian pastoral perspective, it seems to me that Buddhism is much more expert in the study of human freedom and suffering by using consciousness and observation as a method. My one complaint about Christianity is it’s lack of practical teachings on spiritual freedom. Christianity seems too simplistic, especially in an anxiety ridden society like today. The topic of anxiety could be a long one and I won’t get into it today but I wonder if Lewis was touching upon an important topic for today’s culture when he wrote this daily reading.
A Wolf's Wardrobe 