Chapters
Below are just quick notes or quotes from each chapter as a reminder of what to go back to chat about. This isn't intended to be in-depth by any stretch.
Chapter 1
"Your man has been accustomed, ever since he was a boy, to have a dozen incompatible philosophies dancing about together inside his head. He doesn't think of doctrines as primarily 'true' or 'false', but as 'academic' or 'practical', 'outworn' or 'contemporary', 'conventional' or 'ruthless'"
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
pg 11. Keeping the patient's mind focused on the 'inner life' so his actions do not ever reflect his conversion
pg 12. Creating an imaginary person for whom to pray... "In time, you may get the cleavage so wide that no thought or feeling from his prayers for the imagined mother will ever flow over into his treatment of the real one"
pg 13-14. "Let him assume that she knows how annoying it is and does it to annoy - if you know your job he will not notice the immense improbability of the assumption" -> This point is particularly convicting to me
The last point about encouraging the patient to interpret the mother's every move in an over-sensitive fashion is actually very relatable for me
Chapter 4
pg 15. Convincing the patient that scheduled prayer is wrong and that he must create a mood within himself for real prayer reminds me of high school youth groups talking about "praying in the spirit" and silly conversation "combating salvation by works" ideas like scheduled prayer times.
pg 16. "they constantly forget, what you must always remember, that they are animals and that whatever their bodies do affects their souls" 👈 feels a lot like Genesis 3, and humans are never more human than when we exercise self-control.
pg. 16. "Keep them watching their own minds and trying to produce feelings there by the action of their own wills"
I totally remember feeling like I needed to want to pray in order for my prayers to matter
pg 17. "When they say they re praying for forgiveness, let them be trying to feel forgiven"
pg 18. "But whatever the nature of the composite object, you must keep him praying to it - to the thing that he has made, not to the Person who has made him"
Lewis talking actual idolatry with meaningful consequences... not the "money is my idol" take most pastors preach
Chapter 5
pg 23. "...while tens of thousands who do not go so far as that will nevertheless have their attention diverted from themselves to values and causes which they believe to be higher than the self. I know that the Enemy disapproves many of these causes. But that is where He is so unfair. He often makes prizes of humans who have given their lives for causes He think bad on the monstrously sophistical ground that the humans thought them good and were following the best they knew"
WARNING TITLE
This reminds me of the young Tarkan in Narnia: The Last Battle, who Aslan ascribes all his good deeds done to Tash as done to himself - effectively saying the Tarkan's loyalty to the wrong god is honored by Aslan? Definitely want to know more about Lewis' thoughts there and here in Screwtape
Chapter 6
pg 25. "There is nothing like suspense and anxiety for barricading a human's mind against the Enemy."
Screwtape's point in the beinning of the chapter confuses me... He instructs Wormwood to keep the man thinking that the things he is anxious about, the things themselves, are his trials/cross to bear, rather than the anxiety itself. So from the Christian perspective, Lewis seems to be saying that the real-time, present, acute anxiety and suspense in the man's heart regarding the war is the actual trial and cross... not the things the man is anxious about. I don't know what to do with this but it feels convicting to me. Growing up I often had the thought that nothing could be wrong because "I have Jesus", and I would look at my circumstances as things to bear - for me the biggest one was singleness. So would Lewis say my outlook on my singleness as the thing to bear, rather than the anxiety about being single, was the enemy twisting my convictions to be inward rather than God-ward? It clearly looks like my convictions were inward, but I'm not sure I understand how seeing the anxiety itself as my "cross to bare" is any more Biblical...
Chapter 7
page 32. "The fact that 'devils' are predominately comic figures in the modern imagination will help you"
I think It's funny because I bet most people, myself included, reading this book (at least the first time) have a red-devil type figure in mind for Screwtape or Wormwood
page 31-32. "If once we can produce our perfect work -- the Materialist Magician, the man, not using, but veritably worshipping, what he vaguely called 'Froces' while denying the existence of 'spirits' -- then the end of the war will be in sight."
I hear some non-Christian friends say things like "I'm spiritual so I appreciate your prayers". In a sense they believe in some kind of non-physical "thing" but not in any real sense so it looks, to me, similar to what Screwtape longs for in his letter to Wormwood.
page 32. "All extremes, except extreme deviotion to the Enemy, are to be encouraged... Other ages, of which the present is one, are unbalanced and prone to faction, and it is our business to inflame them"
Using Christianity to justify political positions or judgement seems right here. Extreme devotion to our God I don't think should offend people as often or to the degree that many Christians think is right... People flocked to Jesus, only the religious elite and politically powerful hated him. When Christianity is mixed with anything other than itself, that's when it becomes offensive. I think I see people hold to something like Christian Nationalism, and the offensive nature of it justifies the position because "we were always going to be persecured for loving Jesus"
page 34
Let him begin by treating the Patriotism or the Pacifism as a part of his religion. Then let him, under then influence of partisan spirit, come to regard it as the most important part...
Chapter 8
page 39
For He cannot ravish. He can only woo.
page 40
He wants them to learn to walk and must therefore take away His hand; and if only the will to walk is really there He is pleased even with their stumbles
Chapter 9
page 43. "In the first place I have always found that the trough periods of the human undulation provide excellen opportunity for all sensual tempations, particularly those of sex... The attack has a much better chance of success when the man's whole innter world is drab and cold and empty."
I feel this observation in my own life deeply - in my 'troughs' I'm drawn to pleasurable things in a very unpleasurable way
page 44
Never forget that when we are dealing with any pleasure in its healthy and normal and satisfying form, we are, in a sense, on the Enemy's ground.
jargon not wisdom
Of course there is no conceivable way of getting by reason from the proposition 'I am losing interest in this' to the proposition 'This is false'/ But, as I said before, it is jargon, not reason, you must rely on.
Chapter 10
page 49. "Did he commit himself deeply? I don't mean the words. There is a subtle play of looks and tons and laughs by which a mortal can imply that he is of the same party as those to whom he is speaking"
I resonate with the temptation Scretape is basically instructing Wormwood to employ - two-facedness/double-life. In hs/college in particular I would 'play the part' to fit in to a particular crowd. I'd rarely confess Christianity early on, would never deny it explicitly, but would act and talk in a way/about things to imply that I was not necessarily non-Christian, but instead nothing to ask about.
Chapter 10 in overall convicting as it just drives home the point I noted just now.... that I'm very prone to 'acting' in order to fit into a community
Chatper 11
page 55. "The real use of Joke or Humour is in quite a different direction, and it is specially promising among the English who take their 'sense of humour' so seriously that a deficiency in this sense is almost the only deficiency at which they feel shame. Humour is for them the all-consoling and (mark this) the all-excusing, grace of life"
all-excusing grace of life
Humour is for them the all-consoling and (mark this) the all-excusing, grace of life
Basically I understand Lewis to be saying here that men (or the English in particular) take great pride in having a sense of humor - so much so that humor becomes an excuse to laugh at anything. When anything is worth laughing at, then I think it's very hard to prioritize things above others - becuase if everything is a joke, is anything really worthy of more than a joke?
Flippancy
I didn't understand flippancy as first because I've always kind of equated it with "quick". However, it's more of a "quickness" paired with a total lack of respect/awareness for/of X.
churches
Are there areas in the church where we are flippant (specifically with humor I guess?)
Chapter 12
page 57-58
As long as he retains externally the habits of a Christian he can still be made to think of himself as one who has adopted a few new friends and amusements but whose spiritual state is much the same as it was six weeks ago.
page 58. [The dim uneasiness about backsliding Screwtape describes in the
chapter] increases the patient's reluctance to think about the Enemy.
This is too real for me - in seasons of rebellion, and honestly anytime I fall away from "Christian habits" I notice that I am actually reluctant to pray or meditate. Often the only thing that (or the initial thing in appearance) that brings me back is my kids and praying with them or singing Doxology. A choice I wouldnt' make alone, but make for their sake - perhaps this is God's grace poured out on me
page 58
They hate every idea that suggests Him, just as men in financial embarrassment hate the very sight of a pass-book.
Chapter 13
Particularly a challenging chapter. It's interesting to think about pleasurable things, for their own sake and not enjoyed outside the boundaires set for pleasure by God, are harmful to our enemy's tactics. I do not know if I enjoy things for their own sake enough or rightly....
Do my tech hobbies make me more human or less by distracting me from holier things...
Chapter 14
page 69
All virtues are less formidable to us once the man is aware that he has them, but this is specially true of humility.
Chapter 16
page 81
In the first place the parochial organisation [Church] should always be attacked, because, being a unity of place and not of likings, it brings people of different classes and psychology together in the kind of unity the Enemy desires
page 82-83
In order to spare the laity all 'difficulties' he has deserted both the lectionary and the appointed psalms and now, without noticing it, revoles endlessly round the little treadmill of his fifteen favourite psalms and twenty favorite lessons.
Chapter 17
Gluttony of Delicacy, not gluttony of Excess
page 88
You see? Because what she wants is smaller and less costly than what has been set before her, she never recognises as gluttony her determination to get what she wants, however troublesome it may be to others
Chapter 18
Screwtape's lack of understanding,and arrogant questioning, of the Enemy's love is a hilarious commentary on humans who stand staunchly opposed to Yahweh. Academic peers of mine, with such amazing pride, speaking aginst the Biblical narrative because it doesn't make sense... Lewis makes a good point through Screwtape "Members of His faction have frequently admitted that if ever we [demons] came to understand what He means by love, the war would be over and we should re-enter Heaven". I think Lewis' point dovetails with the idea that Jesus is actually very compelling and the rubbish about him being offensive is a replay of the Gospels - where the rich and elite are the ones offended, not the people he calls to the kingdom. Jesus' love doesn't make sense to those who have everything they think they need... His love is for those who know they are lowly
Chapter 19
TODO: Go through and make notes
Chapter 20
TODO: Go through and make notes
Chapter 21
TODO: Go through and make notes
Chatper 22
TODO: Go through and make notes
Chatper 23
TODO: Go through and make notes
Chatper 24
page 130 - It's always the novice who exaggerates...
I think about Summit in particular, where I got to meet a lot of big names in apologetics, and I'd talk about them to others like we were friends... The difference between "I know X" and "X knows me" is a thing I kept hidden so I could feel important
Chatper 25
Christianity And...
What we want, if men becomes Christians at all, is to koeep them in the state of mind I call 'Christianity And'. You know - Christianity and the Crisis,Christianity and the New Order, ...
I don't know... smells more and more like Christian Nationalism is the
modern-day Christinaity And... So much focus on policy, behavior, order
(patriarchy even).... Not a lot about Jesus in the conversation about
Christian Nationalism (not that Christians in this mindset don't genuinely
love Jesus or talk about him - but I don't hear Jesus often in the
conversation, I only hear the politics). But I suppose to be fair there's
every chance in the world that I misunderstand the position and people.
But if I do misunderstand... A fairly educated, theologically competent, Biblically literate person... then what do Christian Nationalists expect of people who never heard of Jesus, or already were introduced to Republican Jesus or something... I'm not the cream of the crop, but if I don't properly understand what the position is about then the world, unbelievers I mean, will be even more turned off to the Gospel
Page 139 - "We have trained them to think of the Future as a promised land which favoured heroes attain - not as something which everyone reaches at the rate of sixety minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is..."
Chatper 26
Unselfishness
Note, once again, the admirable work of our Philological Arm in substituting the negative unselfishness for the Enemy's positive Charity
Big one for me... hard to even process
page 143
In discussing any joint action, it becomes obligatory thta A should argue in favour of B's supposed wishes and against his own, while B does the opposite
Going out to eat, what to do tonight, etc... simple things, not big ones (like how to discipline our kids), is where this is just rampant in my life... I constantly and consciously say in my head "X will make my wife happier even though I don't want to" then after whatever "X" is, turns out she didn't really care or want it OR she's upset because she feels like a nuisance to me... Then the reality is I don't actually know if I saw her as a nuisance in that moment, or if I genuinely wanted to do what she wanted out of love and charity...
page 144
He insists on doing 'what the others want'. They insist on doing what he wants. Passions are roused. Soon someone is saying 'Very well then, I won't have any tea at all!', and a real quarrel ensues with bitter resentment on both sides.
Happens all the freaking time, and at the end of it I'm left with "wtf just happened?"
Chatper 27
TODO: Go through and make notes