Lost Boys Of The Infinitely Gentle Warrior God

Some of my readers know that I am a Christian. Many of you, however, might not know that small fact; perhaps most don't even care. Nor might any of my readers care that I define myself as a "Neo-Orthodox Catholic Episcopalian," though, if I may say so, such a description did once befuddle, to my amusement, the wife of a Unitarian minister (he was my friend). "What could you mean by that?" she asked, confusion strewn across her face. I smiled, leaving her to guess. Why be explicit?

Yesterday I happened upon a C-Span broadcast of Book TV. The guest was Wheaton College professor and C. S. Lewis scholar, Alan Jacobs, who was speaking in Cambridge, MA about his newest release, The Narnian: The Life and Imagination of C. S. Lewis. I caught only the last few minutes of his talk. In answer to the final question posed to him about how C. S. Lewis might confront the postmodern zeitgeist and what Lewis means to us today, Jacobs answered something like this:

Lewis would still bring his erudition and talent to the world of ideas, but he no doubt would have had to educate himself differently than the staid, monochromatic education he received in post-Victorian, Oxonian England. The world, after all, is now a far more diverse place, particularly in Oxford. But he would still speak about virtue, about its timeless and wondrous power; and he would share his intellect and faith without condescension or abuse, never suggesting that his interlocuters were dumb, stupid or blind. But most of all, he would speak to the world about faith like a lover praises his beloved; he would present with elegance and gentility the immeasurable glories of Christianity, boasting of its incomparable beauty. For it was beauty that caught Lewis' breath; it is the beauty of virtue and grace that permeates his writings, which imbues every fiber and tendril, every hue and shade, of Narnia.

Lewis has long been an inspiration to me. I recall the first time I went to a Christian bookstore as a high-school senior. After poring over titles and the names of writers who meant nothing to me, I landed on a collection of essays called The Joyful Christian, by Mr. Lewis. Only a few of my readers would know that I had never heard of Lewis, that my childhood and my education were not what one might call literary or cosmopolitan, or even one whit cerebral. I merely landed on Lewis the way a gull lights upon the shore of a far-inland pond, tossed there by hurricane winds. And when I approached the check-out counter with my selection, the proprietor of the little shop earnestly said to me, giving all due care to my nascent Christian soul, "You don't want to read that. It's awfully heady."

I won't lie to anyone and say that my forays into Lewis' thought were done so with great ease or facility. Far from it. But he spoke to me like few writers have; and his prose stirred yearnings and longings buried deep in my breast. For in my heart I knew what kind of Christian I wanted to be (even, perhaps, the kind I already was); and Lewis, as Aslan's ambassador, called me forth.

But I was far more a lost boy of Neverland than I was a warrior for the Narnian King. My acceptance into a Christian college was achieved by my begging the assistant dean of admissions for a chance, a chance that was granted with the caveat that I immediately be placed on academic probation. Even then, success came slowly; I recall being mocked by my dormmate, a freshman of high standing who was given the school's highest scholarship honors, when I mispronounced "piety" (a new word for me, at least in conversation, I had found in Plato's Euthyphro), which I thought must sound like "deity." And when I say scoffed, I report something vicious and mean; there was no charity in that moment of injury (which still bleeds, at times). I would shake off, often, many other blunders of mind and speech, embarrassing myself in moments of over-reaching, but I managed to graduate with near perfect grades in my two majors, theology and philosophy. Not bad for a lost boy who graduated near the very bottom of his high school class, wits dulled by self-abuse, indifference, and nary a night off the streets.

This post is not about idolizing Lewis, though he is one of my many mentors in the faith. This is not even really about my faith, nor is it about the distinct grace bestowed upon me by Jesus the Christ. My life is about that grace and faith. But when I write occasionally at Contratimes about the mystery that saved me from hitchhiking to an early death, I pray that I honor the example set for me by my elders: that there is incomparable beauty in the Christian faith; that even if false, even if mere fantasy, it is more beautiful than the most articulate truth. Give me the lie that is Christianity over the vulgarity of irresistible accuracy. I am smitten by the Prince who is both rich and raggéd; I am saved by the love of King for His peasants; I am delivered by the King who comes as pauper, dying to save the Queen he thought he'd never see again. This lost boy may still be lost, but I am lost in beauty, a beauty which is my home.

Forgive me if I have failed to act here in a way commensurate with my alleged commitment to grace and beauty, and to the kind King who adores His Bride. After all, I am not of pure pedigree. Much of me remains uncouth, unwashed. Still guilty of over-reaching, I live the baptism which purifies; the purgatory which lifts the dross to the surface. Beneath that surface may there someday be found a heart of gold; the gold that walks on golden streets where lost boys are found.

©Bill Gnade 2006/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.

[Note: This essay was inspired by two things. First, I want to thank Brad at Broken Messenger (what a great name) for his work which touched my heart. Second, I was contacted this morning via email by an old college roommate, a genius of a man, now a doctor, husband, father. He and I have not seen each other face-to-face, one-on-one, for nearly 15 years. But in college he ministered to me like few men have, with all grace, patience, and steadfast love. In intellectual might I was Watson's shoelaces to his Sherlock Holmes; the stall-mucker to his Secretariat; the comma in the paragraph of his prose. PJD listened to me, with never a derisive word, and he wordlessly pushed me beyond what I thought I could be. Among male college friends he stands with CBS (the meteorologist), JSW (the poet-prosecutor), CS (the inimitable financial advisor), BD (of ESPN fame), JS (the banker), NS (the philosopher woodworker), JC (the bassoonist), JV (the psychologist), BW (my first roomie) and the late MS. But it was a gift of God that PJD was standing next to me when I was derided for mispronouncing "piety." To him, and all these gentle Christian men, I bow in thanks.]