Paths and Fields

I'm not the kind of person to learn things step by step. I tend, on the whole, to observe, ponder, read, ponder some more and gradually assimilate understanding. Sometimes a paragraph in a book, or something I notice will trigger an 'aha!' moment - a light in my brain which illuminates something I had not quite grasped before, or maybe a trigger which enable everything to move around a little, fitting into a better place. Either way, it's not a linear or arithmetical process.

Right now, my mind is swirling with the concept of paths, of many different paths leading towards - or, indeed away from - God. That doesn't mean I've become a relativist, or that I think all religions are equally valid. I believe, absolutely, in the one God, Creator of the universe, as revealed in the Bible and through Jesus. Indeed, I can say with confidence the full Nicene Creed, something which is recited in one form or another in the Anglican Church in which I grew up, and to which I still feel significant affiliation.

I also believe that every human being is a unique individual: a complexity of ingrained God-given personality, of circumstances, of culture, and so on. Which means that each of us is on an individual path through life, at different stages, and often going (or apparently so) in different directions. I am aware that there are those who deliberately turn their backs on God and walk away, knowing perfectly well what they are doing. I don't know what will happen to a person in this deliberately antagonistic state if they die unredeemed. I can't bring myself to believe in the kind of 'hell' popularised by Dante; I'm more inclined to CS Lewis's view that even after death there may be the opportunity to turn to God, but that those who rejected God in life will probably continue to do so forever.

Sadly, there are many who have turned their back on God without really understanding what they are doing. Perhaps they misheard or misunderstood the message. Perhaps their childhood was so fraught with tragedy or abuse that they cannot accept a loving God reaching out to them. Perhaps they have been put off by the rigidity of some Christians who claim that there is only one possible path to God, and that anyone who doesn't join that one path is doomed to eternal punishment.

Or perhaps they see Christians being intolerant, selfish, gluttonous, self-righteous... all those sins which were condemned in the Bible every bit as much as the more obvious carnal sins, but which are a lot more difficult to measure.

I don't know what will happen to people like these when they come face to face with Jesus. But I know that God is love. It's not for me to judge, either those on the path away or those (including myself) who may have contributed to the direction in which they are going. My task is to share what I know of God who loves us all.

But what of those who are aware of God's love, whether or not they realise who God is? What of the many and diverse styles and doctrines and cultures even amongst those of us who attempt to follow Jesus? Should we who are within the Body of Christ attempt to tell our brothers and sisters in Christ how we see things, what we believe they should and should not be doing? What happens two people who love God, and can genuinely recite the Nicene Creed, have diverse views about - for instance - whether or not women should be allowed to be church leaders, or how long it took God to create the world, or how parents should raise and educate their children?

I wrote recently about the importance of acceptance, of what we see as 'normal'. We change through our lives, and most of us accept that others change too. We don't expect a great work of art from a two-year-old experimenting with crayons, or a best-selling novel from a six-year-old typing a story onto a computer. But we do expect progress.

Sometimes, though, we have to go backwards before we can move on. If I type quite fast with two fingers but want to learn to touch type, I will have to slow my pace quite significantly before I can learn a new method. If I want to revitalise a garden which has been neglected over many years, I may have to pull up many of the plants that are growing there, to get rid of some of the used soil, to fertilise and remove stones, and leave the ground fallow for a while before I can start growing new plants. When we make bread, we let it rise... then punch the dough down, apparently undoing all the good that the yeast has done, before kneading some more and letting it rise again.

In addition, not everybody has a passion for gardening, or typing, or drawing, or bread-making. We have different talents, different 'callings', different ways of relating to the world in which our primary concerns are to love God and to love other people. So I may demonstrate God's glory by my artwork, and bake bread for my neighbours; you might worship God through music, and babysit for your friends and acquaintances.

Books about personality types stress that there are four (or nine - or sixteen - or whatever the system happens to be) broad categories of people, ALL of whom are valuable. We can all learn in different ways, but one style will come most naturally to each of us. We all have a variety of talents, but only one or two are likely to become our passions. We all make mistakes, miss opportunities, think negative things... but we each have one deep-rooted sinful tendency, which we may not even recognise. We can criticise each other, ignoring our own problems, or we can acknowledge our inherent sinfulness and reach out to others, and to God, in love.

So there are many paths, many ways we can move towards God during our lifetimes. I'm seeing the concept of 'different paths' in many places, with the kind of synchronicity which nudges me, prompting me to be increasingly sure that this is from God. I see it in the local church: your current path might be Anglo-Catholic, his path Greek Orthodox, her path evangelical charismatic. If it's where God has called each person, then that is the right place, at that time, for that person. If God is currently calling someone out of a local congregation, then that is a right path too. Nobody has full access to the truth about God or about worship; we are, as one speaker put it, tiny parts of a stained glass window which, as a whole, reflects a fragment of God's glory.

A few years ago, talking with friends about God's plans and purposes, we realised that it's important not to take the concept of a path too strictly. God does not control us like puppets on a string; we make our own choices in life, and that's part of maturing. As parents encourage their children to spread their wings, to follow their own dreams, to make their own decisions - even if they turn out to be bad decisions - so God gives us our senses, our intelligence and our experience to help us to grow.

So while there is a path each of us, albeit meandering, ahead of us is something more akin to a field. It has boundaries over which we should not stray, but within that field we can go in any direction we like. Sometimes Christians get very stressed about guidance: offered two jobs, which one does God wants us to take? Which car does God want us to buy? Which supermarket does God want us to shop in....?

Undoubtedly God cares about every detail of our lives, and it's fine to pray, to consult God about anything, no matter how trivial. But having done so, if there is no sense of guidance, and no clear Biblical reason not to do something, then I believe that it's fine to take whatever option appeals.

Even if our choice turns out to be a mistake, God does not become angry. We may have to deal with negative consequences - if a car turns out to have multiple problems, for instance, or if we find personality clashes in a new job - but that does not mean that our decision was 'wrong', or even that a different one would have been 'right'. Nor does it mean that we are abandoned. God works with us where we are, as a parent picks up a toddler who falls over, and reaches out a hand to help a child who stumbles.

Even if we go against what God told us, our heavenly Father will never leave us. If a child in a field wants to pick blackberries, the parent might warn him to be careful about the nearby nettles. That will not stop a careless (or curious) child from walking into the nettle patch, and then suffering the consequence of being badly stung. No loving parent stands with arms folded saying, 'Well, that happened because you disobeyed. If you want me to help you, you have to do what I tell you to do.' A good parent rushes to rescue the child, probably risking being stung too, and looks for dock leaves or something else that will ease the child's discomfort, offering hugs and reassurance. The child does not need to be told that he did something stupid: he knows that perfectly well.

It saddens me when I meet people who seem to be hemmed in by fear, convinced that if they step aside from a narrow path, they will - like Little Red Riding Hood - be eaten by a hungry wolf. Yes, Jesus talks about a narrow gate - see Matthew 7:13. Elsewhere, Jesus talks about himself as a door or gate - see John 10:9. I saw a dramatised explanation of this in a children's assembly many years ago, when an elderly clergyman formed several children into a fence with a gap, allowing other children (representing sheep) to go in and out. At night, we were told, it was dangerous for sheep to be out of their pen so in New Testament times a shepherd herded his sheep into their pens, then lay down to block the gap.

The gap was narrow, and anywhere other than the pen could indeed lead to destruction. But the sheep did not have to worry about anything other than going where their shepherd led them. Once in the pen - through the 'gate' - they were free to wander where they wished, to eat whatever looked appetising.

Jesus is the only 'gate', and we need to walk with him, in the place where he wants us to be. But as in a nurturing family, there are many options every day, and Jesus - in the same passage as the one about being the gate - promised us life in abundance, in stark contrast to the thief who wants to steal and destroy.

Far from being anti-church...

It saddens me, sometimes, when people I like and respect seem to write me - and thousands of others - off as being 'anti-church'. The reason for this epithet is that there's quite a growing movement of Christian believers around the world who do not attend Sunday morning gatherings (or 'services') every week.

I am, currently, one of this number.

To be sure, some of these folk have been badly damaged by organised 'church' hierarchies and rules, and can be quite vehement in their eloquence. Others have eased out more gently, finding that these gatherings do nothing positive for them, and that there is no role for them to have. Others have been turned off by angry sermons or off-key worship leaders or perhaps just by boredom. Not with Jesus - nobody could be bored with Jesus - but by the same-old-same-old style of getting together, week after week.

I read an excellent article just a few days ago: Maybe we should stop encouraging people to get out of their comfort zones. An introvert myself, I found myself nodding after almost every sentence. Church services - even quiet, reflective ones - are by nature extraverted. They involve other people, they require going somewhere other than one's home. They are often quite noisy, and although they are usually full of lovely folk, they are not energising or helpful for most Introverts.

This is not to say that Introverts should always avoid church services. I was a regular attender (at least once a week, sometimes twice) at various congregations over the first forty-five or so years of my life. I still enjoy visiting our UK church when we're in the neighbourhood. And, other than during the summer, I try to get to local services here in Cyprus a couple of times per month. I don't even try during the summer since I know that walking home in the late morning sunshine will guarantee me a migraine for the next two days. And a break can be constructive.

But I am far from anti-church.

Of course it's not just Introverts who find the whole church service thing quite stressful. Churches by their nature tend to be quite sensory - music, talks, banners, hugs... all very well in their place, and nobody likes hugs more than I do, from people I care about. But so much sensory input with little time for reflection and pondering can be draining too, for many of us with iNtuiting preferences. People who are not auditory learners can switch off during talks. Those who are tone deaf or sensitive to noise can find singing and instruments to be painfully loud.

And the less said about most church chairs, the better.

Yet there are times when I would love to feel that I 'belong' once more to a local body of believers.  So, when the weather is cool, I tend to walk to a church service at least a couple of times per month. Sometimes I pray that God will let me know clearly if I should commit to this particular group. I am totally willing to do. Yet, so far, every time I have specifically asked, there has been something equally specific which communicated a resounding 'No' - or at least 'Not now'.

We have our small circles, of course; people in our community with whom we share meals, and discuss issues, and help each other out.  And we are, by default, part of the Body of Christ in our town: the local part of the universal Church consisting of all believers. I'm on the email prayer chain for one local church, and run the website for a different one. We have friends in all four of the local English-speaking congregations. We also have several Christian friends who do not attend church services at all - or more rarely than I do.

What puzzles me is why so many Christians have elevated the Sunday morning gatherings so highly, when the Christian life is clearly so much more than a Sunday morning meeting. Why is listening to a sermon considered more valuable than reading a book? Why is prayer in a group considered more significant than praying on one's own? What is it about singing that evidently draws some people closer to God, yet pushes others away?

Some congregations, to be sure, include many other factors in their meetings. There might be visual displays, quizzes, dance, drama, painting. And let's not forget the all-important coffee-and-biscuits afterwards.

It's all cool. It's all part of life, and the Christian life in particular. There's a time and a place for all those things and more.

But why, when people decide for a season - or a few years, or even a decade or two - that they can worship God more effectively and openly away from a structured (or even unstructured) group meeting, are they considered heretics?


And perhaps the most puzzling question is:

Why do those who love church services seem to feel threatened by those who do not...? 

On Intuition, Narnia, and a little mediaeval astrology...

I don't recall how old I was when I first read the Narnia septet by CS Lewis. I know that I was captivated by the series at a young age, and read them regularly.

I do, however, remember a thrilling moment when I was perhaps ten or eleven. I was re-reading the books, and had reached the end of 'The Voyage of the Dawn Treader'. Aslan the Lion appears as a lamb, and invites the children to a breakfast of roast fish. Then he tells them that he is in their world too, by another name.

It seems odd in retrospect - the Christian imagery in the books is so well-known, and so obvious to me now - but until that point I had not made the connection. I had grown out of hoping that I might find Narnia myself in the back of an old wardrobe; I no longer believed in fauns and talking mice. But I did wish, with an intense longing, that Aslan could indeed be found in our world. I suppose it was a classic moment of Introverted Intuition, when it all suddenly made sense. Aslan was Jesus. I went from a deep wish to a deep insight within a few seconds, and was then able to see the allegorical nature of the books - or, at least, the metaphors which were well-known to me at that age such as Creation in 'The Magician's Nephew'; Good Friday and Easter in 'The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe'.

It was a great moment, and I'm glad that nobody made the mistake of explaining it to me before I was ready to find it for myself.

Over the forty-odd years since then, I've picked up and read the books again and again. It has occasionally occurred to me to wonder why they seem such a disparate set of books: 'The Lion...' is almost a classic fairytale story of good conquering evil with the Redemption story at the heart of it. It's uplifting, cheerful, and probably still my favourite of the books. It's also the best-known. I never particularly liked its sequel 'Prince Caspian', which is filled with battles and conversation in the forest. It brings the children back to Narnia, but in a disappointing kind of story, even though it ends well enough.

On the other hand, I very much liked 'The Voyage of the Dawn Treader', in which Caspian is a little older and on a quest over the sea. It has a lighter feel to it, several instances of people overcoming different temptations, and the beautiful ending which first gave me the insight into the Christian nature of the series. The only chapter I didn't like at all was the one called 'Two Narrow Escapes', where the company visited an island with a dangerous pool.. when reading the book, I used to skip that chapter. On the other hand, the amusing chapter about the Dufflepuds is one of my favourites in the whole series.

'The Silver Chair' has a different feel to it again - of swamps and gloom, of another kind of quest, this time to rescue a missing prince. I loved Puddleglum the Marshwiggle, but found the story increasingly tense even on the tenth or fifteenth time of reading.

I would usually read those four books in order, then 'The Magician's Nephew', even though that is chronologically the first, dealing, as it does, with the creation of Narnia. It always felt to me like an add-on, a book to explain how the other books came about, with a lot more set in the real Earth than in any of the others. Then there's 'The Horse and His Boy', a book which never felt to me as if it fit with the others at all. It's the story of a boy taking an important message, learning about Narnia, realising his courage, and discovering some surprising roots. I like it - but it seemed very much like a misfit, with no forays at all into our world.

Then there's 'The Last Battle', a final book if ever there was one, with graphic pictures of 'end times', taking us to the very end of Narnia and the hope of Heaven. I don't much like that one, either, but would always read it as the last in the series.

A year or so ago, Amazon recommended that I read 'Planet Narnia', in which Michael Ward, a learned scholar, had apparently found a new 'key' to what he calls the Narniad. Something to do with mediaeval astrology. I read reviews, which were mixed, and might have thought no more; but then a friend read it, and felt that it was worth reading. Then I saw it referred to elsewhere, and became increasingly curious.

I've finally finished reading it.

The author makes an excellent case for an underlying theme which Lewis did not spell out to anyone. He quotes extensively from his works, and from his early study of mediaeval planetary images. He also goes deeply into the explicit use of planets-as-archetypes which Lewis employed in his science fiction trilogy. He makes his case well, and it felt like another piece of the jigsaw, or perhaps a sight of the picture on the box of a puzzle, helping the whole to slot into place.

The theory, in a nutshell, is that each of the seven mediaeval planetary archetypes influences the writing of one of the Narnia books. Sounds unreal? Yes, it did to me at first. Michael Ward sums up his theories on the FAQ page of the Planet Narnia site - and they are quite appealing.

In five of the seven suggestions he advances for a planetary theme for each of the Narnia series, I agree entirely.

The planets are not the ones we know today; indeed, two of them (Sol and Luna) are the bodies which we know as the Sun and the Moon. Uranus had not yet been discovered in the mediaeval times from which Lewis takes his imagery, nor is Earth included. She seven 'planets' are: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Sol and Luna.

While I have some knowledge of ancient Greek and Roman myths, I was impressed at the thoroughness with which Michael Ward went into detail about each planet. Detail is really not my thing, but I did very much like a term he coins early in the book: 'donegality'. This is taken as the essence or theme of something, the underlying tone of a book, the 'big picture' one retains when the particulars have vanished from memory. For each of the books Ward gives us his understanding of its 'donegality', linking it with one of the mediaeval planetary deities, and then picking out a lot of fine detail to reinforce his point.

I could see instantly that according to this theory, 'Prince Caspian' is connected to Mars, the Roman god of war. Woods and battles are the donegality of the book as far as I'm concerned; Mars, apparently, was also supposed to have an affinity with trees and vegetation. There are themes in the book of chivalry, knightliness and 'necessary' wars to overcome evil, and I found myself actually liking it more in the context of the planet Mars.

Perhaps the next most obvious one is 'The Silver Chair', which is connected with Luna, the moon. Her colour is silver, her light reflected. Much of the story takes place underground, or in the marshes, giving a feeling of half-light. There is discussion of 'lunacy', too, and much more. Then 'The Last Battle' is evidently about the passing of time and its ravages, fitting in well with Ward's theory that this final book in the series was written with Saturn in mind, known in some circles as 'Father Time'.

There are long chapters dedicated to each of these, of course; I'm only touching on what I perceive as the 'donegality' in this post.

Ward also contends that 'The Lion..' was written with the influence of Jupiter in mind, and that 'The Horse and His Boy' relates to Mercury. These are not quite so obvious at first glance, but as I read the relevant chapters, I could see that they make sense. Jupiter - also known as Jove - features jollity, feasting and kingliness, as well as winter becoming spring. Father Christmas, who always seemed like a bit of an oddity in the first book, suddenly fits in rather well with the image of a genial giver. Mercury, by contrast, is known as the message-giver, and master of language and liguistics. Of all the books, 'The Horse and His Boy' is most concerned with language - with Bree the talking horse, and Calormen poetry, and the importance of getting words correct. Mercury is also related to twins, something else that leaps out of the book.

This brings me to the remaining two books, and here is where I find myself in disagreement with Michael Ward. He matches Venus with 'The Magician's Nephew', citing the great fertility of the newly-formed Narnia, and the apple which Digory plants. And he matches Sol, the sun, with 'The Voyage of the Dawn Treader'. There's a sense of light, and mention of gold in the book which seem to back this up.

But although I was prepared to accept Michael Ward's explanations, I didn't find either of those two chapters convincing. And while I hesitate to disagree with such extensive research, I would personally put them the other way around.

Ward claims that the name 'Dawn Treader' suggests the sun. To me, it suggest Venus, the 'Morning Star'. Moreover, the word 'Voyage' is one used in the alternate title for 'Perelandra', the second of the science fiction trilogy ('Voyage to Venus'). In 'The Voyage of the Dawn Treader', most of the action - like that in 'Perelandra' - takes place in a watery world peppered with islands. Venus is the island goddess, her home planet supposedly one covered with water.

There are temptations galore in 'The Voyage of the Dawn Treader', including Lucy's temptation to make herself more beautiful - similar, again, to one in 'Perelandra', and surely related to Venus, once more, rather than Sol. Moreover, it seems that the simple (and very low-key) romance Caspian finds at the end of the book is much more appropriate, in a children's book, than Ward's mention of carnality at the creation of Narnia, notwithstanding Frank and Helen's future children and grandchildren.

What of 'The Magician's Nephew'? As I said above, I don't have much of a 'feel' for the book as a whole, but if I must have a nutshell image, it is of suns.. the dying sun in Charn, the daylight in the 'real' world, and the newly formed sun of Narnia. The scenes at the end involving the apple tree and Digory's mother are used by Ward to add to the Venus image, but it seems to me rather more appropriate to Sol; besides that, the idea of a Tree of Life is surely an overt reference to the temptation of Eve in the book of Genesis. According to the Planet Narnia post about Sol, his influence makes people wise and liberal: this is what Aslan asks of Frank and Helen when he crowns them as the first King and Queen. And I'm quite sure Lewis's choice of name for the first Queen is not an accident: 'Helen' is derived from the Greek word for sun.

Finally, Ward makes much of Sol's metal being gold, and points out various references to gold in 'Dawn Treader'. Undoubtedly they are there, but in re-reading 'The Magician's Nephew', I found just as many. Significantly, most of them were referring to Aslan himself, whereas in 'Dawn Treader' they are more related to the temptations of wealth (such as the dragon's lair, and the 'Deathwater' island). Venus the goddess is associated with sweetness, warmth and laughter. The ship's company in 'Dawn Treader' find warmth and sweet water at the end of their journey; and while there is certainly some laughter in the creation of Narnia, it's not nearly as amusing as the 'Dawn Treader' chapter featuring the Dufflepuds.

So, while I cannot begin to emulate any of Michael Ward's scholarship, and am well aware that I may be totally wrong... my feeling and intuition tell me that 'The Voyage of the Dawn Treader' is more connected with imagery of Venus, and 'The Magician's Nephew' with Sol.