In Surprised By Joy, CS Lewis explains his conversion to Christianity. His conversion process involved philosophical reasoning that I disagree with. When I told a fellow school pupil that I had read a book about Lewis' conversion, I was asked, "Oh, did CS Lewis become Catholic?" In that milieu, "conversion" meant Protestant becoming Catholic, not sceptic becoming Christian. I thought at the time that that was exceedingly narrow.
A graduate student that I knew was a teenage convert from Islam to Christianity but strongly influenced by Hinduism. He felt able to attend a Hindu Temple while seeing Christ at the centre. When I asked an adult convert to Catholicism, "Why?," she said only, "Well, the first time I came into a Catholic church, I felt as if I had come home...," then, "So I made enquiries about the Catholic Faith and realized that there was no turning back!" That was all.
In Poul Anderson's Technic History, Adzel and Axor have converted to different Terrestrial religions but there is no story about either conversion. Poul and Karen Anderson do describe a conversion to Christianity in The King Of Ys, Volume IV, The Dog And The Wolf. Corentinus asks Gratillonius whether he believes in the one God, His Son and Their Spirit, with a few more doctrinal details. Gratillonius replies that he does and thinks that he must.
Why must he? Gratillonius' cultural environment has always assumed allegiance to gods although there has been some variety. He feels that Mithras has failed him. At the same time, he is surrounded by friends and colleagues who are Christians and the Empire that he had served was officially Christian. He is simply moving with history by becoming Christian just as later generations will move with history into other world views.
31 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I remember reading somewhere that Lewis never made the leap from Anglicanism to Catholic Christianity due to the lingering cultural influence of Ulster Protestant anti-Catholicism. But this never made him vicious to or about Catholics.
I have heard of non-Catholics who, before any formal conversion, felt similarly at home in Catholic churches. I would put that down to them feeling the welcoming Presence of Christ in the Reserved Sacrament.
IIRC, Fr. Axor did say the influence of Jerusalem Catholic priests of the Galilean Order studying Forerunner ruins on Woden led to his conversion to Christianity.
Ad astra! Sean
"In that milieu, "conversion" meant Protestant becoming Catholic, not sceptic becoming Christian."
I do see Christian becoming skeptic referred to as "deconversion".
Cross-influences are common.
For example, the founder of modern neo-paganism/Wicca spent a -lot- of time in India and points adjacent, and was strongly influenced by both Hinduism and Buddhism.
Kaor, Jim and Mr. Stirling!
Jim: Or in the other direction! E.g., to cite a UK example, the writer Malcolm Muggeridge came from a prominent Labour Party family, was an atheist, a hard leftist and sympathizer of Communism. But he was also an honest man and visits he made to the USSR in the 1930's made him thoroughly disillusioned with Marxism and socialism. By the 1950's Muggeridge had totally rejected his former leftist views. And in the 1960's he converted to Christianity (not sure if as an Anglican), a process ending with his conversion to Catholicism in 1983.
Mr. Stirling: I assume you had Gerald Gardner in mind. I have one or two books about neo-paganism/Wicca and a lot of what I read about him made me think he was more than half a fraud.
Ad astra! Sean
Gardner's biographer told me something about him. Maybe more later.
Many honest men saw through the USSR in the 1930's but were not therefore disillusioned with either Marxism or socialism. These issues cannot be categorized so easily. I was thoroughly unimpressed with Muggeridge's writings.
Kaor, Paul!
I disagree, Marxism has been totally and utterly discredited wherever it came to power. Every time socialism has been attempted it has always failed, from the time of the Plymouth colony in MA to the bloody tyrannies set up by monsters like Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, et al.
Of course Muggeridge's works does not impress you, but I liked what I read of his writing.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Marxism has not come to power many times. People calling themselves Marxists have run state capitalist bureaucratic dictatorships. Socialism has not been attempted many times. I do not ask you to agree with me. I do ask you to acknowledge that these issues have been discussed before and that there are different honest answers to the questions raised. Mere repetition should be avoided.
You cannot disagree with the proposition that many honest people do not see Marxism as totally and utterly discredited. There are many such honest people. I met with 3,500 of them in London at the weekend.
Muggeridge argued that either Christ never was or he still is. A third possibility is that, like many other people, he was but no longer is. Muggeridge's argument is the verbal equivalent of a transparent card trick.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Not true, what you said about Marxism. You cannot have socialism without the misnamed "state capitalism." Socialism always ends up with politicians and bureaucrats incompetently and brutally running an economy from the top down. Which is why all Marxist regimes have secret police, purges, mass executions, and concentration camps.
I disagree with your assertion socialism has never been tried. I repeatedly cited the Plymouth colony's experiment with socialism because it was not tyrannical or bureaucratic. The Pilgrims attempted socialism, took note of how and why it did not work, and sensibly abandoned it.
Ad astra! Sean
A guy writing a biography of Gardner addressed Briganti Moot which I attended while it met. He said in his talk that Gardner was good at saying things which were factually true but completely misleading. When he repeated this to me in private conversation afterwards, I asked him for an example. Example: Gardner asked a member of a coven to write/invent/create/make up a Midwinter ceremony for him. Then, in a book, he wrote, "And another ceremony that I have heard is..." and repeated the ceremony that had been written at his request, giving the impression that it had already existed and that he had merely heard it.
His intention was to deceive. Thus, if this account is true, he lied.
Sean,
I have replied to each of these points before and reply to them again only because you raise them again. Like you, I have repeatedly said things. What is the point of this repetition? You seem not to remember what has been said before. I do not agree that there have been many Marxist regimes. Things can be different with properly used high technology in future.
Surely we have got to the point where we should just disagree and discuss something else instead of repeating "I disagree," "wrong," "discredited" etc? None of this will lead to agreement so what is the point?
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
If what you said of Gardner is true then my view of him being a fraud is vindicated.
I can only plead in extenuation is that I speak as I do because Marxism enrages me! How many more millions of people have to die because of that failed ideology? But I'll hush up.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
It is not a failed ideology. If you simply present the parameters of the debate entirely in your own terms, then you will continue to be disagreed with and there will never be any proper discussion, just this repeated statement and denial.
Capitalism and imperialism enrage me. How many more millions of people have to die because of continued wars for territory and resources?
(I am not "enraged" but I mirror your violent language.)
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Disagree, Marxism is the attempt by brutal monsters to make the impossibility of socialism work using all means possible, no matter how tyrannical. The failed Five Year Plans, Great Leaps Forward, massacres, purges, killing fields, gulags, etc., of all Marxist regimes condemns it.
Disagree, we have wars because human beings are flawed, imperfect, and prone to being quarrelsome, contentious, violent, etc. Not because of free enterprise economics.
But I am dropping this.
Ad astra!
Sean,
Disagree. Marxism is not that. I have pointed out what it is and you can read elsewhere what it is.
Disagree. Economic competition causes wars and is redundant with the potential production of abundance.
Human beings are not merely flawed, imperfect, quarrelsome, contentious and violent. I have shown often enough how there can be conditions in which there is no need for conflict. We do not fight for the air that we breathe but some of us would fight for the last oxygen cylinder in a space station. Human "flaws" could just as well be used to excuse ideological dictatorships!
What is the point of all this repetition? I can accept that we disagree but it seems that you cannot. Thus, you must repeat an uncompromising condemnation which is a gross parody of historical events. I have been through the stages of the degeneration and bureaucratic defeat of the Russian Revolution. I do not ask you to agree but I do ask that, if this exchange continues, then you at least acknowledge that something has been said instead of continuing as if it had not been said. Otherwise, we just repeat ourselves forever more to no purpose whatsoever.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
We are never going to agree about Marxism. I reject it, for the reasons given above.
No, we have wealth and abundance because of economic competition. Unlike you, I don't consider "competition" a per se bad thing. I am sticking with the wisdom and hard headed good sense of Adam Smith and his successors.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
But we are not trying to agree! Of course you reject Marxism as you misconceive it. I would reject it if I thought that that was what it was. Russian workers' councils deposing the Provisional Government were democratic. The Bolsheviks held them back until they had a majority.
Competition did produce wealth and can now be transcended! I do not consider "competition" per se a bad thing. Competition in sport is good. Economic competition becomes redundant when technology produces more than everyone can need. There is no longer any need to compete for resources or profits. We have said all this before. You want to re-say it endlessly. I do not see the point.
Paul.
A strong enough will to believe generates sincere belief... and at lower intensities, sort of a twilight half-belief.
Also, of course, a religion may be started as a con-game, but become perfectly sincere.
Eg., Mormonism. I think their original prophet was engaged in a deliberate con, but Brigham Young was perfectly sincere.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling and Paul!
Mr. Stirling: Makes sense to me. What I read about Joseph Smith makes it easy to suspect he was a conman. But a true believing Brigham Young saved Mormonism from disappearing.
Paul: The Provisional Gov't should have shot Lenin and his cronies when it had the chance to do so. Its weakness enabled Lenin to use those so called workers councils for seizing power as a dictator.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Nothing so called about them. I don't agree with shooting political agitators. Lenin warned the Party that Stalin was accumulating too much power and would not know what to do with it.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
You are still missing the point: Lenin discarded these "soviets" once he no longer needed them. And he crushed their remnants during and after the Kronstadt revolt.
Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky, et al, were all evil and vile men!
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
I am not missing the point. I am disagreeing with you.
The soviets were not discarded. They were physically destroyed, their members killed in large numbers, by civil war and the collapse of industry. Those who were not killed in conflict were atomized, reduced to starvation and disease or to mere survival. Democracy inevitably ceased to function and attempts to revive it were suppressed by the emergent bureaucracy. You ignore these material social processes. May I say that you are missing the point? No. I do not claim that my understanding is the only or the obviously correct one but you seem to be completely unaware of alternative explanations.
Kronstadt was a disaster which proved that by then the revolution was lost. I know people who continue the tradition of Lenin and Trotsky, not Stalin, and they are very far from being evil or vile. Many are intelligent, informed, cheerful and genuinely good. There are also potential Stalins who would certainly become dictators if those conditions were repeated. It is our responsibility to prevent that from happening. Forward out of the present chaos, not backward into even worse abominations.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
That hideous, catastrophic, monstrous "revolution" was lost because all Lenin cared about was grabbing power and being a fanatical tyrant. It was Lenin and Trotsky who crushed the Kronstadt rebellion. They cared nothing about the "soviets," except as instruments for seizing power.
It will not do, blaming the horrors of Marxism on Stalin. All he did, after Lenin died, was to extend and complete the monstrous regime Lenin founded.
And I deny those "soviets" had any right to set themselves as the rulers of Russia. I deny a small section of Russian society, "industrial workers," had any right to order about a vastly agricultural and peasant country whose interests will not be the same as those "workers."
It does not matter if many Marxists are nice, decent people--because they will be among the first to be shot or imprisoned by would be Lenins using them as tools for seizing power. I reiterate that Marxism is a discredited, blood soaked failure.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
I reiterate that Marxism is not a discredited, blood soaked failure. There are many people for whom it is not discredited whereas the present world system is both discredited and blood soaked.
We will have to neutralize those "would be Lenins." The outcomes of future struggles and upheavals are not preordained.
Russian industrial workers were indeed a minority and that was certainly a problem but it is no longer the case.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Then I believe such Marxists are ignoring the bloody history of that failed and discredited ideology.
Except ruthless, determined, and shrewdly wily people like Lenin are very likely to outwit and outmaneuver people not as cruel as they are. Which is almost exactly how Anderson characterized Lenin in "Details"!
I was talking about 1917, when Lenin was busy plotting to seize power, not now, in 2024. Between them Lenin and Stalin destroyed the Russian peasantry.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Such Marxists study history. They do not ignore it. It is not a failed and discredited ideology. You cannot make this true by simply repeating it.
These wily people are a figment of your imagination. A mass movement with new transparent organs of collective power cannot be outwitted or outmaneuvered by ruthless individuals somewhere in the background.
I know you were talking about 1917. "Plotting to seize power" is more conspiracy theory stuff. The soviets deposed the Provisional Government when they had a Bolshevik majority, not before. The Bolsheviks held back the Petrograd workers until then.
But, in any case, that particular worker-peasant conflict will not be repeated in future. We learn from past conflicts and mistakes and also from new, unprecedented developments.
Sometimes I think that you try to terminate an exchange by simply repeating that you are right and that the other side is wrong. You cannot do this. There will always be a rejoinder. Either we end, for the time being, with a mutually recognized honest disagreement or we never end - and I certainly do not want that second option!
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
No, every time Marxists came to power the only result has been tyranny. And I stand by everything I said, including what I said of Lenin.
But I will end this discussion.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Marxists have not come to power many times! Certainly regimes have used "Marxism" as an ideology as they have used "democracy" and "Christianity." Marxism is not about any group coming to power but about a fundamental change in economic, social and political relationships.
I stand by everything I have said, including what I have said about Lenin. This has not been any sort of discussion.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Everything I have learned about the Monster tells me Lenin was a horrible man who founded an evil regime.
Ad astra! Sean
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
Before I forget, I wanted to say science fiction has its share of con men. Here I mean L. Ron Hubbard, who founded the Church of Scientology.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
I suspect that you have read only or mainly works hostile to Lenin. I have read Lenin, Trotsky and their successors. I think that Solzhenitsyn's LENIN IN ZURICH is a travesty of Lenin and other revolutionaries who, for example, would not have jubilated on hearing of Bloody Sunday. Or, if a few did, then others would definitely have argued against them. I know such people now.
Everything I have learned about Marxism tells me that there is far more to it than just the question of whether Lenin or any other individual was a horrible man.
Paul.
I am just on my way out for the evening. Such contentious issues cannot possibly be resolved by an exchange of uncompromising disagreements and denials. I would prefer not to discuss the issues in this way but I respond to what is said. In Russia in 1917, entire social classes were stirring, moving and acting. What happened and what went wrong was not just down the machinations of a few individuals, still less to a single monster. Is it helpful to talk about monsters - or at least to highlight them? Nazi Germany has to be understood in the light of German social conflicts in the twentieth century, not just in terms of the psychology and insanity of a single individual. There is something very wrong in societies that propel such individuals into leading positions.
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