Mere Christianity

In his book Mere Christianity, C. S. Lewis defends different topics of Christianity. I found many of his ideas very interesting including the idea that there is none of our impulses can be defined as either good or bad. To better explain this, Lewis gave the example of playing the keys on a piano. A piano doesn’t have “right” and “wrong” notes, but at a specific time one note is right and the others are wrong. I found this concept to be true because there are instances in our lives where certain actions would be inappropriate and at other times they could be good. An example of this is debating. Debating just for the sake of causing a fight would not be a good action, but debating to show and prove your beliefs is a good thing. I thought Lewis’s analogy with the piano was very precise, and it helped me understand better what he was trying to say.

Another part of this book that I found compelling was how he defined the two different views of how the world came into being. The materialist view is that of the world being created by chance. The planets somehow came into being by chance, and certain chemicals came together at the right temperature to create life. The religious view, however, says that the universe was created by a higher being with a mind. Lewis says that these two ideas were present throughout all of time. I agree with Lewis on this point because the Bible clearly tells us that God created all things and that is why there is a religious view. The materialistic view exists because it is impossible for the reprobate to understand and believe what God teaches us about creation in His word so they turn to science for all of their answers. At the end of the chapter, Lewis also mentions another view of how the universe began. Some people believe that the world was started by a “Life-Force”, but then it continued to evolve from there. I found it interesting how Lewis described this belief and why it appeals to so many people. It gives them the comfort of a higher being watching over them, but they can still sin because this “Life-Force” has no mind or morals. With this idea people can have all the benefits of having a god without actually doing anything for it.