Mere Christianity (C.S. Lewis) - 01
Preface
By the time I had read 166 pages—roughly 48.8% of the total 340 pages—I already felt an urgent need to pause.
Even while continuing with the rest, I felt compelled to start organizing what I had read so far.
Throughout the book, C.S. Lewis’s insights often burst forth unexpectedly, leaving me in awe, accompanied by fleeting reflections. Before those highly volatile fragments disappeared, I felt the need to preserve them as much as possible. That sense of urgency constantly urged me on, for Lewis’s message was powerful and invigorating.
Was this man really once an atheist?
It wasn’t until his early thirties that he converted to theism. In the latter half of his 65-year life, he made significant contributions as a Christian apologist, writer, and essayist. He was a storyteller who, having spent the first half of his life in his own world and the second in God’s, “understood God with reason, and felt and expressed Him through imagination.”
While reading Mere Christianity, even as I repeatedly marveled at Lewis’s profound insight, I resolved to read on as a persistent and sharp-eyed critic.
Structure
Mere Christianity is structured as follows:
Part 1. Right and Wrong as a Clue to the Meaning of the Universe
Chapter 1. The Law of Human Nature
Chapter 2. Some Objections
Chapter 3. The Reality of the Law
Chapter 4. What Lies Behind the Law
Chapter 5. There is a Reason for Our Anxiety
Part 2. What Christians Believe
Chapter 2. Some Objections
Chapter 3. The Reality of the Law
Chapter 4. What Lies Behind the Law
Chapter 5. There is a Reason for Our Anxiety
Chapter 6. Rival Conceptions of God
Chapter 7. The Invasion of God
Chapter 8. The Shocking Alternative
Chapter 9. The Perfect Penitent
Chapter 10. The Practical Conclusion
Chapter 11. The Three Parts of Morality
Chapter 12. The “Cardinal Virtues”
Chapter 13. Social Morality
Chapter 14. Morality and Psychoanalysis
Chapter 15. Sexual Morality
Chapter 16. Christian Marriage
Chapter 17. Forgiveness
Chapter 18. The Great Sin
Chapter 19. Charity
Chapter 20. Hope
Chapter 21. Faith (Part 1)
Chapter 22. Faith (Part 2)
Chapter 23. Making and Begetting
Chapter 24. The Triune God
Chapter 25. Time and Beyond Time
Chapter 26. Good Infection
Chapter 27. Obstinate Toy Soldiers
Chapter 28. Two supplementary explanations
Chapter 29. Let’s Pretend
Chapter 30. Is Christianity Hard or Easy?
Chapter 31. Counting the Cost
Chapter 32. Nice People or New Men
Chapter 33. New Men
I wanted to reflect on every theme and argument he presented, examining them through the lens of my own perspective. This is not merely a summary or dissection of his book; rather, it is a record of the thought process that emerged as his ideas were projected into my own mind.
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