'Mere Christianity': Why C.S. Lewis' Book Is Overrated

C.S. Lewis authored 'Mere  Christianity' based on BBC radio lectures.

In a recent WSJ essay by Notre Dame Emeritus Prof George M. Marsden  ('Mere Christianity Still Gets A Global Amen', Mar. 25., p. A9) we learn C.S. Lewis never planned for 'Mere Christianity' to be a book. In fact:


"During the dark days of World War II, the writer presented four sets of BBC radio talks on basic Christianity. He had these published in several paperbacks. Not until 1952 did he collect them together into the new  title".

We then learn C.S. Lewis' work has sold "more than 3.5 million copies in English" and "been translated into at least 36 languages". And oh, by the way, it's next only to the Bible in educating Chinese Christians and "is still read by thoughtful evangelicals, along with thousands of Catholics and mainline Protestants."

Why this popularity? Prof. Marsden touches on assorted possible reasons, including: "attention only to the timeless truth of Christianity and not the latest theological fashions",  avoidance of "chronological snobbery" (believing modern tenets of faith are superior to ancient ones) and a "knowledge of many areas of literature and language" as well as history.

In mastering all of the above, Lewis "acts like a guide on the journey from unbelief to faith". Yet in the same breath we're informed by Lewis himself that "becoming Christian isn't an improvement but a transformation".

Which begs the question that if becoming a Christian isn't an improvement then why would there be any impetus to go that route? Why not instead become a Buddhist, or an atheist? 

We're offered no rational answers only told by Marsden that  "not everyone will see the beauty or be persuaded".

Indeed, why would they  - the critical thinking skeptics?   Because if one reads 'Mere Christianity' between the lines as opposed to in a daze, it ought to make them realize Lewis' collection of his BBC radio talks is actually a primitive generic apologia nothing more.

For example, Lewis’ justification for Inquisitional tortures is mind-boggling and effectively renders whatever morality he espouses as useless, and indeed dangerous! In Mere Christianity he pardons the witch burners for a “mistake of fact”, i.e. in believing  that women described as witches were actually evil incarnate¹. To quote one critic²:

If Lewis is willing to accept that witches do not exist, and that, while believing in them, it was right to put them to death, what other "ungodly" transgressions can we forgive as mere "mistakes of fact”?

Indeed, Lewis' expeditious moralism is enough - or should be - to convert any sentient being into a committed atheist. Because, contrary to Marsden's depictions, Lewis' debased morality is little better than that invoked by John Paul II and others to defend moving pederast priests around parishes to avoid their prosecution - and a black PR eye for the Church. After all, if JP II simply made a "mistake of fact" why hold him to account now? Heck, go on and expedite sainthood to sweep all questions from further consideration. What better way to try to get the faithful and outside critics to shut up about it and move on?

Interestingly, Lewis’ pseudo-morality would easily have been incorporated into the Third Reich’s justifications for genocide. I mean, if they really believed the Jews were “vermin” – as so much of their propaganda portrayed- why not grant the same license as Lewis grants the Inquisitors and witch hunters? . So by Lewis’ standards, revealed in 'Mere Christianity',   they’d be excused for making a “mistake of fact”.
 Inquisitors gutting, burning and carving up heretics and one lesbian (far left). Did they simply make a "mistake of fact" as C.S. Lewis proclaims in his 'Mere Christianity'?


Lewis might well reply here that the Nazis really knew better than that so their actions were inexcusable. But how do we know that there were not also more percipient Inquisitors who also knew better? Say than to believe that more than a quarter million women burned as witches did not really embody evil or have pacts with “Satan”?

Or, that the heretic caught in the Inquisition's vice grip could not really harm the Church, but by the ruling of ad extirpanda his property could be confiscated ....so why worry? The Church gets richer and it's only at the cost of one life, then another....and another.  Who was counting? (See: The Inquisition of the Middle Ages  by Henry Charles Lea.

It amounts to mere question begging.

Rather than any "beauty" or power of innate persuasion one has to conclude 'Mere Christianity' is perhaps the greatest exercise in artful question begging and moral misrepresentation the world has ever known. Thus, it's just as well when the "greatest religious literature"  was identified (in 'The Greatest Christian Book of All Time Tournament)- as Prof. Marsden notes- it was Augustine's 'Confessions' which came out "first seed", not 'Mere Christianity'. 

The Confessions, which we studied as part of our 2nd year Theology course at Loyola (1966), actually resonates with the reader as Augustine imparts his own path to what he saw as truth via his own experiences, good and bad. In the process, via those intimate disclosures,  an entire morally consistent world view unfolds with deep insights which even an atheist (as I turned out to be) can appreciate. For example, consider Augustine's magnificent foray into the basis for truth, deception  and even happiness (p. 192, Dover edition (1955) and translation by Albert Cook Outler). In the case of the latter Augustine writes:

"Why are they (men)  not happy?  Because they are so fully preoccupied with other things which do more to make them miserable than those which would make them happy, which they remember so little about. "

The universality of insight exposed here could well have been taken right out of the Dalai Lama's collection of meditations and admonitions ('Many Ways To Nirvana', 2004)  or from Buddhist philosopher Alan Watt's book, 'The Book on the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are’.

 In regard to the general human aversion to truth, Augustine is equally percipient (ibid.):

"Why, then, does truth generate hatred, and why does the servant who preaches the truth come to be an enemy to them who also love the happy life, which is nothing else than joy in the truth - unless it be that truth is loved in such a way that those who love something else besides her wish that to be the truth which they do love. Since they are unwilling to be deceived, they are unwilling to be convinced that they are deceived.  Therefore, they hate the truth for whatever it is that they love in place of the truth. They love truth when she shines on them; and hate her when she rebukes them. And since they are not willing to be deceived, but do wish to deceive, they love truth when she reveals herself and hate her when she reveals them."

Such deep insights can only arrive by deep self-knowledge, not by a secondary imitation of enlightenment, or a synthetic derivation confected from radio talks designed as an apologia - as Lewis created.  Those who have read 'Mere Christianity' are therefore strongly advised to read Augustine's book and make the comparison.

At least enough people already have (in the Christian "Best Book Tournament") and were able to separate substance from sophistry.

1 Lewis: Mere Christianity, 14.

2 Inniss: The Secular Humanist Newsletter, (Spring, 1998), 1

The Enigma That Is C.S. Lewis

                                                         C.S. Lewis

C.S. Lewis, noted Christian apologist and fictional author (The Screwtape Letters, The Chronicles of Narnia) appears to be enjoying a revival of sorts as a version of his 'Screwtape Letters' is currently playing here in The Springs. Of course, all the resident fundagelicals are going ga-ga over it, but one wonders why.

Lewis, by his own accounts, certainly wasn't dogmatic or doctrinaire. Indeed, it appears the fundies' love for him is evidently based more on assorted canards and myths than reality. All of this lends an aura of enigma to Lewis' life and actual beliefs.

One of the myths is that Lewis used to be an "atheist" who eventually found the light in his thirties and came back to Christianity. In fact, like another Brit of renown - Antony Flew - Lewis was no atheist.  Flew himself was more a secular humanist than actual atheist. But fundies made a huge deal over his "conversion".

The truth is somewhat more mundane and his book There Is a God, is especially instructional. Just one minor little problem with that, Flew never wrote the book!  According to a piece (‘The Turning of an Atheist’) by Mark Oppenheimer. Flew admitted in an interview that he never wrote the book. The actual author was Roy Varghese, a Christian apologist, who did all the original writing and then showed it to Flew, who for some reason okayed it. This was confirmed by Varghese, to Oppenheimer, who describes Varghese as “a crusader and financial backer of those who believe scientific research helps to validate the existence of God.

Getting back to Lewis, he was actually more a devotee of Celtic mysticism from his teens until his 30s, when he rejoined the Anglican Communion. For a great article skewering his so-called atheism see: http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/aah/inniss_8_2.htm  Quoting from the piece:

"Lewis must have been one really chicken-shit atheist. He certainly didn't bear himself with the confidence I have observed in every atheist I have ever met. In Surprised by Joy (now there's a Christian title for you), Lewis characterizes his and others' atheism as follows: "I was at this time living, like so many Atheists or Anti-theists, in a whirl of contradictions. I maintained that God did not exist. I was also very angry at God for not existing. I was equally angry at Him for creating a world." This is kind of like having a dog, but hating it for not barking at prowlers—a dilemma no atheist would recognize."

Indeed, Lewis's alleged atheism borders on the ludicrous. At the very least it's an infantile mutation ...probably much like the self-proclaimed "atheism" espoused by the Columbine Killers. In that respect, it isn't an atheism that any genuine atheist would recognize,  far less embrace. But why be surprised, if so many also thought Antony Flew was a bona fide atheist?

Lewis'  personal Christian re-awakening then spurred his Christian Apologias, including "Mere Christianity", "Miracles", "The Problem of Pain" and "The Screwtape Letters." Chronicles of Narnia can also be included since it plays and reads like a parable-based Apologia, with the evil doers clearly delineated and the Lion ("Aslan") obviously a stand-in for Christ, including the way he's seemingly offered as a blood sacrifice.

Meanwhile, in a kind of reverse theological psychology, Lewis, in The Screwtape Letters,  fabricated an exchange of letters between Uncle "Screwtape" and demon nephew "Wormwood", wherein the mentor demon attempts to educate nephew on the fine points of tempting humans. The letters are elaborate and often go into moral fine points, conundrums and subtleties - so much so that if one isn't careful to remind himself  it's clever  fantasy - he can almost be lured into thinking these are two real demons communicating about human weakness.

At face value,  Lewis’ unconventional morality lesson emerges as a creative masterpiece at getting the unwary to accept demonic reality and personalized evil. But even a minimal application of reason and numerical logic would disclose it is nonsense.

By way of example, in May of 1990 during a debate at Harrison College, Barbados with a Christian who invoked Lewis’ Screwtape narrative I had occasion to do the math for him. I noted that given Lewis’ original likely demonic population of two –thousand, then it followed that when the human population hit six billion each demon would have 3 million humans (each) to try to tempt into a Hell -bound act each day. Given a uniform load, and dividing the labor equally, each demon would only have about 0.028 seconds per day for each temptation.

Obviously, if the world began with only a couple of thousand agents of temptation, they’d never be able to keep up with the temptation burden as the human population increased to hundreds of millions then billions! In this way I used an argument analogous to reductio ad absurdum to show Lewis’ Screwtape fable to be just that, an elaborate fable


Lewis at the time of the original writing (1942), probably expected the serious rationalist to believe that such a clever parable could entice people to accept evil manifested in personal demons. In the same way, he probably expected the same in one of his most famous attempts at attacking Materialism. In that instance, he asserted that "Materialism is self-refuting" - in that if it denies everything (including God) except colliding atoms and molecules in the brain, then one can't possibly account for a consciousness capable of thinking, reasoning and even being critical of itself.

Alas, Lewis was tilting at the windmill of an ancient Materialism - the one conceived by the ancient Greek atomists Demokritos and Leucippus. The one in which matter is reduced to 'hard' atoms and molecules simply interacting with each other endlessly in a reductionist phantasm.  It would be at least 15 more years before a quantum -based Materialism arose that embraced invisible fields, and waves as opposed to basing reality on hard particle interactions. This new view was perhaps embodied best in the quantum potential of physicist David Bohm:


V_Q=   {-ħ²/ 2m} [Ñ R]² / R


I can't fault Lewis too much because in his simplistic approach he couldn't have known how difficult issues of different forms of Materialism would subsequently become. In a stirring article appearing in Philosophy Now, (Nov./Dec. 2012, p. 28)  Graham Smetham cogently argues that since formal quantum mechanics dispenses with the fiction of a truly objective observer (hence configurations of matter are dependent on the observer and his apparatus) then the mind cannot be reduced to the brain.  If any Materialist models do so, or regard consciousness as an epiphenomenon, then Smetham dismisses them as  "false models of Materialism". They embody a false Materialism because they attempt to explain something as complex as thought and consciousness using simple molecular interactions.

Central to discriminating opposing Materialist models of mind are qualia. The term refers to subjective properties perceived in the material world, including colors, shapes and sounds (music). Arguably, none of these have objective existence but are tied to our neural processing and mode of consciousness. The qualia problem is often also called the Mary problem since it presents a hypothetical character (“Mary”) who inhabits a black and white world, but knows everything about colors in physics terms. Still, though she knows what color signifies – a particular wavelength in the electromagnetic spectrum – she has never experienced it.  The qualia problem helps to distinguish between what many call monistic physicalism and what I refer to as quantum physicalism.

In this sense, and in hindsight, we now know that a crude version of the monistic physicalist form of Materialism is what Lewis was actually attacking - given THAT form demanded a hyper-reductionist format. Lewis' problem then, wasn't God being omitted from the equation, but the absence of the broad spectrum of quantum mechanics that enables a Materialist explanation of consciousness without invoking supernatural essences.

One wonders how transformative a philosopher Lewis might have been had he had at hand the insights of modern quantum mechanics.

But one thing we do know:  his embrace of Anglicanism rather than Christian Fundamentalism should come as no surprise and not be an enigma. Lewis was a rationalist thinker to his dying day, and though he 're-converted'  he never trusted ideologies or faiths (even operating under the umbrella of Christendom) that arrogated to themselves all truth. This is a cautionary note many of his fundie followers would do well to bear in mind.

Materialism is NOT "self-refuting"!

One of the annoying canards atheists have had to deal with over the past several decades is the claim that our base philosophy - physicalist materialism- is "self-refuting". When religionists assert the idea of materialism is self-refuting they mean that the reductionist basis of materialism is inadequate to account for a non-material or non-physical phenomenon such as thought. Effectively, the apparent non-material existence of thought is enough to convince religionists, especially supernaturalists, that materialism is trumped. They forget, or never processed in the first place, we are invoking PHYSICALIST materialism by which invisible fields, forces etc. are fully represented!

They forget, or care to ignore, that we know life itself can be accounted for by things not necessarily alive, such as DNA, proteins etc. Of course, a better way to put this is that these inanimate elements or factors are necessary conditions for life as we know it. There may be other “sufficient conditions”. Today, when one pragmatically addresses causality, it is preferable to use necessary and sufficient conditions rather than allude to some vague, undifferentiated causality.

Thus, for a car accident to occur, being in a car and on the road is a necessary condition. Sufficient conditions may be that the driver’s blood alcohol was over 0.15 and that his brakes gave out at the critical instant at an intersection.

The argument that materialism is “self refuting” was originally put forward in the popular context by C.S. Lewis (originally an atheist who “saw the light” then became a Roman Catholic). More recently, philosopher Mary Midgley has argued that materialism is a “self-refuting idea”.

Catholic philosopher Ed. L. Miller probably circulated the idea most widely via university philosophy courses) with his textbook: ‘Questions that Matter’. In his chapter on Materialism, Miller’s efforts fall flat when he takes on the sophisticated arguments of philosopher J.J. Smart, who uses quantum physics and its indeterminism to extend the basis of that philosophy away from its ancient (and overly simplistic) Greek origins.

As we know, modern materialism is now more accurately physicalism – since it embodies not merely the atoms of Demokritos, but also the indeterminate physical aspects of matter addressed by quantum mechanics. This includes existence of de Broglie (matter) waves, multiple fields, as well as quantum nonlocality (verified in Alain Aspect’s 1982 experiments at the University of Paris) and the principle of superposition of states as well as Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle. What this means, is that the hackneyed arguments people originally gave – based on attacking ancient Greek materialism- no longer hold water.

In the aspect referred to above, Miller attempts to discredit Smart by asking:

“If all thought is purely the result of physical brain activity then why should the content of this thought be anything special... why pay any attention to it if it is thus self-refuting?”

This, however, is based on several egregious assumptions, not the least of which is the unproven belief that self-refuting thought can be unimpeachably identified within the physical matrix that engenders consciousness. As I note in my (2000) book, 'The Atheist's Handbook to Modern Materialism' (p. 164) - since there's no practical method to identify the site of a specific thought (where the associated quantum wavepacket collapses at specific synapses.) nothing can be said about the quality or content of the thought. In other words, the supernaturalist can't make any claims about thought in a purely Materialist context. Including whether it is "self-refuting".

Second, it assumes that a physical-based thought is less enriched, human or nuanced than one emanating from ....I don't know....a "soul-driven" brain? But since none of these geniuses has put forth an objective test to discern the two types of thought, it's somewhat like arguing how many angels are on the end of a pin!

The physical theory of quantum mechanics enters brain behavior since, as physicist Henry Stapp has pointed out (‘Mind, Matter and Quantum Mechanics’, p. 42), uncertainty principle limitations applied to calcium ion capture near synapses shows the Ca++ ions must be represented by a probability function. Specifically, the dimension of the associated calcium ion wavepacket scales many times larger than the ion itself- nullifying the use of classical trajectories etc.

Since the Ca++ wavepacket information is ultimately describable in terms of quantum mechanical wavefunctions, e.g.

U (x,y,z) = u1(x, y,z) + u2(x,y,z) + u3(x, y, z) + …..uN(x,y,z)

Then there is necessarily a “superposition of states” applicable until wavepacket collapse. This means any nascent thought within the wavepacket is literally in a “black box”. That box isn’t “opened” until the thought itself emerges whether in speech or writing.

“Opening” the box (selecting the single thought to be expressed out of all competing ones) would be analogous to disturbing a system with a measuring apparatus. In this case, as David Bohm notes (Quantum Physics, Dover, 1951, p.128) each of the terms above in u1, u2 etc. must include an exponential function with “an unpredictable and uncontrollable phase factor”, call it ‘φ'.

Thus for each term above, include the factor: exp (iφ) with the phase factor φ changing with the order of the term. For example, the first term would be written:

U1(x,y,z) exp(i φ1)

In his 1991 book, ‘Consciousness Explained’, Daniel Dennett invokes a somewhat superposition –based analogy (albeit not at the quantum scale) in his “multiple drafts” description of consciousness. In this, the brain fashions multiple drafts for thought, for example, before a final single draft emerges. Dennett, by the way, does an excellent job in dispelling once and for all the need for a “commander pilot” or “soul” that has to be “seated” in the brain to direct it or enable it to perform.

None is needed, because in truth and fact, the way the brain works in generating “multiple drafts” and producing a final outcome (as a thought) renders any “pilot” redundant. In these type of theories, Dennett’s and mine (at the quantum level) we see that the “soul-pilot” emerges as an illusion. Our own brain has been complicit in this in creating the illusion there is someone or something behind the eyes, and pulling the strings. There isn’t.

The belief there is something “behind the eyes” is a carryover from ancient, Aristotelian modes of thought. The same modes evident in Aristotelian physics which maintained that heavier objects traveled faster when dropped from a height because they “desired to reach the Earth more quickly”. Hardly!

It is unfortunate that humans for the most part remain in the throes of antiquated modes of thought more peculiar to the ancients. Julian Jaynes (‘The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind’, 1976) perhaps best described these as “lacking the sense of metaphor … that characterizes a more advanced mind”.

However, as science makes greater inroads these antiquated relics will surely fall away as people realize that invisible “entities” that were invented hundreds of years ago have no basis in reality. And once science can provide an answer, even an improbable one, the use of any competing non-natural hypothesis must fall by the way side – unless the proponent wishes to be guilty of the fallacy of ignotum per ignotius .(Seeking to explain the not well understood by the less well understood). At the end of the day, natural explanations therefore will always trump non-natural ones – because the latter are always “less well understood” by definition. And up to now, no non-natural realm has been demonstrated even remotely, only speculated on)

In a way, it is ironic that the theologian’s “soul” is the real self-refuting basis for thought. This is because absolutely no evidence exists for a “soul”. It is pure theological conjecture. Meanwhile, we know the brain exists – it can be measured, weighed and thoughts – as altering levels of brain activity- actually recorded using positron emission tomography.

We know the possession of a brain is at least a necessary condition for the most rudimentary thought. To this point no one has demonstrated that thought originates without a brain. When they do, one might be able to seriously consider the possibility. As for sufficient conditions for thought, it’s plausible that at least one is that when an action potential has been propagated by an axon, the neuron on the opposite side of a synapse fires.

Again, the necessary condition is already in place, and the sufficient condition uses that and goes beyond it.

Until the religionists disprove this is the case, or can show their own necessary and sufficient conditions for thought (in particular that it can occur without benefit of material medium) they are wasting their time in semantic exercises of unknown utility.

In some ways this argument bears similarity to the “ether’ once postulated in physics. It was believed for many years that light needed a medium (“ether”) to propagate and couldn’t do so in a vacuum. This is somewhat analogous to the feeling of many vitalists that a “soul” is required for thought.

In physics, the Michelson-Morley experiment finally rendered the ether a redundant anachronism, or an unnecessary ‘macguffin’, inserted because people believed it was “needed”. But now we know light can indeed propagate in vacuo. I am confident that one day the “soul” will be rendered just as redundant in terms of thought and consciousness.