Alright... got my book... have looked at the cover so far...

Got mine in the mail today. Looking forward to it!

I ordered on Amazon and then had to cancel when I realized their estimated shipping date was "April 1st - April 14th". Sigh. I'll head to Chapters today and grab it.

Got our copy yesterday. Dew and I are good to go.

I am starting.

Such is the case

I am about 1/4 of the way in, and find the writing method somewhat annoying. I guess it's designed to make the pro-Jesus message seem like less of a sermon, and more like a literary work so that the book can be taken more "seriously" as a piece of literature, or to perhaps be placed in a different section of the bookstore. I, for one, find it somewhat annoying... It's almost as annyoing as "All The Best, George Bush: My Life and Other Writings", which I have purchased for approximately $2.99 and never read...

It did make me think about WHY he would write it the way he did... Does Christianity have such a bad image nowadays that in order to be taken seriously by the inteligent, and therefore obviously secular (tongue in cheek), crowd, one has to conceal the message underneath various gimmicks (i.e. talking lions and beavers)?

Unfortunately, I think that may be the case. With all of the bible-thumpers and "religious fundamentalists, crackpots preaching the teachings of "The Prophet" or "The Messiah" on street corners, and hicks singing "Hallelujah", I'm not surprised... I guess Screwtape and Wormwood have done a good job of making "religion" seem like a tool or a drug only "for the weak...", who have no place in today's competitive, survival of the fittest, present day...

Juraj, I agree. I find the writing style very annoying and at times confusing. I'm 140 pages in and it's not getting any better. I will save further analysis until I'm done.

Ok. I’ll be honest. Overall, I hated the book and it will pain me to rehash memories of it. I only finished it because I am a dedicated member of this prestigious book club and I respect everyone's choices. Otherwise, I would have pulled the chute on it long ago. The first quarter was kind of cool: the novelty of it all. But I found it spiraled into an abyss of confusing syntax and philosophical diatribe that I didn't care to unravel. I mean, I get what Lewis is trying to do (kind of what you were meaning Juraj) and I get the themes he's trying to touch on and how they relate to Christian doctrine (distraction, temptation, sex, gluttony, materialism (convincing the 'patient' of using the world as an end and faith as a means)), but for someone that thinks the whole Christian notions of temptation and sin are ludicrous, I thought it was silly. I find it annoying that Lewis uses a fictitious character (the devil) and a fictitious setting (hell) to some how authenticate Christian morals.

And call me diabolical, but I find that I agree with Screwtape in some instances. For example, the part about praying on page 148. I also can’t help but sigh at Lewis’s whole notion that war and violence are God’s way of waking men from moral stupor and providing them with an opportunity to be courageous (page 161). I think the book would arouse discussion and debate about important issues, as long as they have nothing to do with the actual book itself.

The best part of the book for me was when I finished hate-reading it. What I enjoyed with great amusement was the blazing irony of what C.S. Lewis says in the Preface for Screwtape proposes a toast: “I never wrote with less enjoyment…It would have smothered my readers if I had prolonged it.” I couldn’t agree more!

I also just finished "hate-reading" this book, but after my first comment, I took a slightly different approach. Instead of concentrating on what I didn't like, I tried to take a positive or interesting thought from each letter. This made me enjoy the rest of it a lot more than I first had.

Without going into too much of a religious debate, I am very much interested what you meant by your comment about temptation and sin being ludicrous. Are you saying there is no such thing as "good" or "bad" and that it is all relative? Or are you taking the Anarchist approach and implying that we should all do whatever we feel like, irrespective of what others may feel like or do? Can you please elaborate?

Overall, I think this is the kind of book that someone being predisposed to certain beliefs or notions would enjoy. Nontheless, I think there are some thought-provoking points that made me think about the whole notion of religion and Christianity. Simply things like being proud of being humble, and essentially becoming "comfortably numb" with your existence until you lose all sense of direction and drive... Taking it more as a social commentary about life in the 20th century rather than a criticism of a secular lifestyle made me see it in a much more favourable light.

The book also made me think of a Fight Club quote quite often:

Man, I see in fight club the strongest and smartest men who've ever lived. I see all this potential, and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact.

Let me clarify and be more specific. I don’t think the concepts of temptation and sin are ludicrous in and of themselves. What is ludicrous to me is the Christian interpretation of them. ‘Original sin’ is the pillar of Christianity, which begins with Adam’s ‘sin’ in the Garden of Eden. For me, the fact that Christianity rests on Jesus dying for the imaginary sins of an imaginary character is kind of weak (for those that take the story of Genesis literally). To claim that someone was tortured and crucified for the hereditary sins of a fictional character, and for all the future sins of every person from then on, is to me, well, ludicrous.

To answer your other question, I definitely do not think everything is relative, as I hold some things to be universally egregious: child molestation, rape, etc. But I also think that morality evolves with the times, and I don’t think that Christian theology (the bible) is the gold standard for what is good and what is bad. For example, there’s nothing in the bible about children’s rights, women’s rights, gay rights, black emancipation, etc.). What I’m saying is that if the bible was the be all and end all for morals and judgments of what is good and evil, we would still be stoning homosexuals, Jews would be stoning other Jews for working on Shabbat, we would kill our children if they talked back, etc. I’m not saying that you can’t draw positive moral lessons from the bible or Christian teachings (as you mentioned), but I genuinely believe we do not need the bible, or religion for that matter, to ultimately decide what is good and what is evil. And let me be clear that I don’t know what your stance is on this, so if it seems like I’m making presumptions about you, I’m definitely not. I’m just trying to give you my perspective based on your questions. But I am interested to know what you think.

Oh, and I forgot about temptation. So, to finish on a lighter note, I recall Lord Henry in The Picture of Dorian Gray: “The only way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it.”

You mean you are currently NOT stoning homosexuals?!?!?! Tsk tsk tsk...

I was just curious by what you meant by that comment. I am by no means a big proponent of Christianity… or to put it more precisely, the general interpretation and execution of the teachings in the Bible. I guess what I’m saying is that I feel that Christians give Christianity a bad image/name. I personally wasn’t there 6000 years ago so I can’t comment on what things may have been like back then.

However, I also think that there is a logic behind all religious teachings, and a lot of the rules in any religion do make a lot of sense when it comes to preserving a particular society. Just as with any prophetic or religious writing, there will always be misquotes, and misinterpretations. I think that this is simply inevitable with any literature, more so with literature that is written some time ago, and even more so with literature that is translated time and again. I read once, for example, that currently, Nostradamus is the most misquoted person. Something like 60 or 80% (can’t remember) of his quotes are misquotes…

I personally don’t have an opinion on whether homosexuality is right or wrong, just as I don’t have an opinion on whether rape or murder is right or wrong. If, for example, Hitler was raped by a big Aryan mofo and saved by a Jew, would history be different? Would the end justify the means? Not sure… Personally, I wouldn’t mind living in a society where I was constantly being raped by women, no matter how ugly, fat, or old they were… Being raped by guys would probably not be as much fun. I’m not an expert on that topic.

All joking aside, I think people should have the right to be gay, just as much as other people should have the right to set up rules to strictly exclude gays from their society if they so choose. I am not sure, for example, why religious ministers were forced to marry gays, if asked to do so, by law in Canada. Is forcing someone to act against their morals and core principles any better than rape? So it’s great that some individuals got their freedoms, but it’s always at a cost of someone else’s.

In short, I think our “enlightened” and developed society has just as many f’ed up rules as does the Bible, Bhagavad Gita, Qur’an or whatever else. There is always a flip-side to every freedom we have. So why not kill kids if they talk back (you’ll have to point me to where it says that), the tram would perhaps be a lot quieter in the morning as a result.

Nor does the priest have to deal with the haunting psychological trauma for the rest of his life. Are you serious when you say that you don't have an opinion on whether rape is right or wrong??? I think saying that rape is "no worse" than breaking a religious or moral custom is revolting, and this would justify everything those sick Catholic priests have done. In fact, I know in Judaism you are allowed to break the rules of Shabat if it's a matter of life and death. The reason being: life is more important than customs or traditions!

Also, so you think a society should decide whether it wants to exclude homosexuals. Do you feel the same about ethnic/racial minorities? Handicapped? Elderly? So would you say Apartheid South Africa was justified because the government's freedom to exclude blacks was just as important as the fundamental human rights of blacks? There are certain things that don't need a majority consensus, because they are considered to be universal human rights, which transcend all other rights. This is what a civilized society does (or should do). And I would be interested to know what "f'ed up" societal rules Canada has that are comparable to those in the Bible or Qur'an. Can you give me an example or two?

And the passage on talking back to your parents can be found here: Leviticus 20:9 -- "For every one that curseth his father or his mother shall be surely put to death: he hath cursed his father or his mother; his blood shall be upon him."

You know in gym class, when everyone is doing jumping jacks and there are always those people who do them half-assed, lethargically raising their arms and not moving their legs at all? That's how I felt reading this book: by the end, barely anything was registering in my brain. As the great Curly of the 3 stooges once said, "I'm trying to think, but nothing happens."

That's a fairly random metaphor... I wonder how that popped into your head when making your post.

This might be true for the first few chapters, but then it grew old rather quickly. The formula for each short chapter:

- I see your patient has done X
- X could lead to A or B
- Both A and B have their pros and cons
- A is good / bad because...
- B is good / bad because...

ZZZzzzzZZZzzzz

That's a fairly random metaphor... I wonder how that popped into your head when making your post.

I might have had a dream with Miodrag in it that stuck in my subconscious.

This book is a testimony of its times. Religion is one of humanities ways of explaining it's own existence. In this perspective, I found the book interesting. But only interesting: like when you think a movie is entertaining and only entertaining. I thought it would get better, but it never did. I felt I was being lectured on the merits of Christianity, which at the core are quite relevant, but get manipulated into something very unnerving. The sermons took interesting angles, depicting different facets of the human condition, but fell very short in inspiring me. Every chapter was similar to the last in terms of relying on my own moral compass and trying to understand the authors point of view. Very exhausting endeavor.

I enjoyed the lines in the Toast about I'm as good as you: "..the social group which gave to the humans the overwhelming majority of scientists, physicians, philosophers, theologians, poets, artists, composers, architects, jurists, and administrators. If ever there was a bunch of tall stalks that needed their tops knocked off, it was surely they."

In the end, life is all about how you see the world and your role in it, no matter your class, profession, gender, sexual preference, race, etc.

I agree with Leo in the sense that there definitely were some interesting, and thought-provoking social commentaries in this book if you could lower your defences enough to try to see past some of the negative or "annyoing" aspects. As I wrote earlier, I had to kind of reset my mindframe after reading the first 60 pages or so, and to look at it from a different perspective, or else I would have really not enjoyed it at all.

I fully agree that it's little comments like the one Leo quoted about humour that really provoked some thoughts. After having some time to settle my thoughts, I really appreciate C.S. Lewis' ability to notice such things. He's a more serious and religious version of modern-day Seinfeld...

Even though the format was somewhat annoying to me, I actually couldn't think of a better way of writing it if I had to do it myself. Anything other than the somewhat satirical format that the author chose to employ could have been regarded as too preachy, self-righteous or whatever...

My impression was that Christians would love this book, but as Leo pointed out, it's not the case. I made the comment because it seemed like the first two heathens to finish the book very much didn't seem to enjoy it... Regardless of the fact that there is a Christian message behind the whole thing, it is nonetheless a fairly decent commentary on our society...

In short, I don't think I wasted time by reading this book, and don't regret doing so either.

Yeah, the whole letter format made things a bit dry and rigid. After reading the book, I would have much preferred the following format: Wormwood's diary. You could have pieces of advice from Screwtape (as interpreted by Wormwood), a dialog between Wormwood and the patient's sub-conscious, while also going into more detail about what the patient was up to and Wormwood's reaction to it.

Could I do this myself? Hell no. Would this format have been better? I think so, if done correctly (yes, I'm aware that that is a monumental "if").

I haven't even so much as mentioned the book's religious message and whether I liked it or not. I could care less. I disliked the book, period. It was a bore.

If I'm reading a book and I treat each chapter as a chore, then I have no choice but to give it thumbs down. That's it. There are plenty of good books about sin and virtue--both religious and non-religious--that are splendid reads (don't ask me to name any!). I believe the Screwtape letters is not one of them. Stop taking my dislike for this book so personally. I still love you, Leo.

I don't know why you don't believe me when I say I was bored to death reading this book--religion did not come into play.

According to my calculations, you were half-way through the book on April 23rd. For fun, let's say you started reading on April 1st. Half-way through means page 100. Given all the blank pages between chapters, let's just estimate that there are 75 full pages in the first half of the book.

75 pages / 23 days == 3.26 pages / day. I can make "a well founded assumption" that you must have been riveted. I can read more sitting on the toilet. I daresay that you were just as bored as I was.

I fully agree with you Leo. This is exactly what I mean when I keep talking about how I had to change my frame of mind. I had to get out of the "it's gotta be bad because it's written by a bible-thumper" mindset to enjoy it. I am not anti-Christianity per se, but I had to read a lot of crap in my childhood that was decreed as being good merely, as I suspect, due to the fact that it was written by a particular Christian. Most of it was not, in fact, well written. For this reason, I automatically have a bit of a "knee-jerk" reaction to all somewhat religious writing.

However... at the risk of saying nothing new. I will fully back you up on the fact that this book does have a lot of interesting points on "modern life".

I suppose the whole "The Enemy ACTAULLY loves these vile creatures..." thing COULD fall under most religions... granted...

I’ve figured it out: the way to get Len passionately involved in the Book Club is to get him on the defensive (how ironic)

Look, a few things. First of all, C.S. Lewis was a self-proclaimed Christian Apologist, meaning that it was his aim to “present a rational basis for the Christian faith, defend the faith against objections, and expose the perceived flaws of other world views.” And coincidentally, The Screwtape Letters is a Christian apologetics novel. So to say that you don’t see how Christianity was so embedded into the book would be like Alan Dirshowitz writing a book about letters between a senior and junior Arab suicide bomber, and their attempts to recruit a new suicide bomber, and failing to see the pro-Israeli message in the story (wow, that’s actually a really good idea for book. I’m officially laying all copyright protection on it). If The Screwtape Letters was written by someone other than C.S. Lewis, you may have some kind of a point. But it wasn’t, so you don’t.

Did you not read my previous entries? (see next)

I wouldn’t say that the format was boring as much as the actual content of the book was. As Maur said, religious undertones aside, it was simply a boring book that I dreaded opening up, and normally would’ve stopped reading somewhere around page 120 if it wasn’t for this book club. And that had absolutely NOTHING to do with its religious undertones. I think it was a dreadfully boring book. End of story. Agree to disagree.

What exactly is wrong with criticizing 'faith,' and what is intolerant about it? Are you saying that religion should somehow enjoy special immunity from criticism? That is actually what I think is one of the inherent problems with the way people treat religion and faith, in that people consider it ‘off-side’ from criticism. Why is it okay to criticize somebody for being, say, a Communist, but once you start to criticize his or her ‘faith,’ you’re being intolerant? I don’t think religion should enjoy such protection, and I think I shouldn't have to shy away from questioning why someone believes in talking snakes and stoning homosexuals.

Really? Is that why I'm reading the Old Testament? Because I hate religious content? Not a well-founded assumption at all. On the contrary, there is no topic that has interested me more in the last two years than religion. So no, I didn't shut my brain off because of the religious content of the book. I shut my brain off BECAUSE THE BOOK SUCKED AND IT BORED ME TO TEARS.

If this is aimed at me, enlighten me please.

+1

Those look nice together.

Although this was my least favourite book so far, this discussion is hands down the best we've had.

I address this question to Thompson: are you:

1) a "hater" or "a nitpick" who "shut your brain off because of [the book's] religious content", who can't "read beyond the words on the page", who "has no tolerance for a religious message," who is "lazy", like myself, or

2) I was planning to quote all the mean names I've called Len in this thread, but can't find any... Damn.

Edit: This is how I feel.

See post #42.

I thought your "syntax" made things pretty clear, actually.

First of all, I never said I liked the book. I said I thought it was "kind of cool, the novelty of it all." Which is true, and which puts to rest your assertions that I had biases since the second I looked at it. And even if I did like it at first, why is it "excessive" to start out liking a book, and end up hating it? It was a new book, the premise sounded cool, and it was for the book club. I was giving it a chance (quite contrary to what you think, which I'll get to in a second).

Not true AT ALL. If you re-read what I’ve written (see next quote), I don’t find "the entire premise of Christianity" silly, just CERTAIN things.

PLEASE SEE NEXT QUOTE:

How is it I didn’t bother to analyze what he was saying, but yet you refer to my analysis????

WRONG! WRONG! WRONG! Last year I started a book about the Spanish Civil War. I got 200 pages in, and I had to stop. It was so boring, I couldn’t bare it anymore. Would you ever continue to question why I stopped, and why I found it so boring? Do I have some bias against Spanish Civil War writing? Was it because I love Hemingway so I therefore had a Republican bias? No! It’s because it was boring, it was confusing, and I didn’t care to delve into it any further. That’s it! There’s no conspiracy.

Now, did I find certain things in the book silly? Yes. Do I find certain things in Christianity to be silly? Yes. But do I find everything in Christianity silly? No! (again, see above). But that is not the principal reason for not liking the book. I didn’t like the book principally because (for the 100th time), I found it dry and boring, just like the Spanish Civil War book. And if you don’t believe me, I don’t know what else to say. I almost get the idea that you assume I am intolerant because I find certain things in Christianity to be silly.

Don't you guys work?

Love the action so far. I don't really have anything to add to this vivid discussion except you all have good points, as to what they are...I'm working and have not time to enumerate them all.

That is, perhaps, what I find "silly" about people's interpretation of Christianity, that they take everything LITERALLY, as opposed to allegorically. I am not intolerant, and do take that personally. Len, I think you are lying if you say you don't find certain things in the Old or New Testament to be silly. Or would you like to tell me otherwise?

I find this to be a very interesting passage:

"My point, once again, is not that those ancient people told literal stories and we are now smart enough to take them symbolically, but that they told them symbolically and we are now dumb enough to take them literally." --John Dominic Crossman

To iron things out a bit, Len I will concede that my rejection of certain Christian teachings partly informed my hatred of the book. But in no way did this inform my hatred before actually reading the book, since I didn't fully know what the book was about. And again, for me, it was more the language and the philisophical diatribes that led me into the abyss of boredom and confusion. Like I said, I am reading the Old Testament out of interest, not intolerance. If it was all so silly, why would I even bother reading it? A lot of it is boring, but a lot of it is very interesting, and like you said, there is power in mythology.