Wednesday in the 5th Week of Lent: Letter 29

The Scripture Lessons for Today are HERE!

The Germans are bombing London and the area where the Patient is living so he is faced with the very real possibility that he will be killed. 

With this in mind, Screwtape now questions his nephew on the approach he will take with his temptations.

In this letter we will see Virtues, vices, and emotions coming into play and how each can affect the other. 

The first question is whether to aim for cowardice or at courage with the resulting pride or hatred of the Germans.  Courage is a Virtue so not something a demon can create in the Patient.  Rather, if the Patient has courage, then it must be twisted and corrupted. 

As Screwtape tells Wormwood, “To be greatly and effectively wicked a man needs some virtue.”   

Good men chose to follow Attila the Hun and wasn’t because they were impressed with his wickedness. 

Shylock is a fictional character in William Shakespeare’s play, The Merchant of Venice.  A Venetian Jewish moneylender, Shylock is the principal villain and his downfall and forced conversion to Christianity are the climax of the story. 

Having never seen the play, I’m not really sure which virtue is corrupted, but it sounds like his demon figured it out.

The problem for the demons is that the existence of some virtue keeps them from taking full control of even the most wicked of villains.  In other words, there is always the opportunity for repentance and forgiveness.

Hatred brings together both the vice and extreme emotion.  You will remember from previous letters that demons can do a lot of bad through the emotions.  Couple war, hatred, and the tension of human nerves and “… it is only a question of guiding the susceptibility into the right channels.”

Hatred combines with fear to most effectively corrupt humans.  As Screwtape points out

The more he fears, the more he will hate.  And Hatred is also a great anodyne for shame.  Tom make a deep wound in his charity, you should therefore first defeat his courage.

 

Now as Screwtape tells Wormwood, great care must be taken to not allow the Patient to look within when confronting his own cowardice. 

As he tells his nephew,

The danger of inducing cowardice in our patients , therefore, is lest we produce real self-knowledge and self-loathing with consequent repentance and humility….  It is there possible to lose as much as we gain by making your man a coward; he may learn too much about himself.

Whenever we are considering the moral life, it is tempting to view ethical questions as black or white and virtues and vices as an either/or proposition. 

There are certainly absolute truths as we have studied in earlier letters and we might also consider the idea that there are actions that are always wrong. 

However, there are many more moral and ethical questions that fall in what we can call a gray area.  In other words there are elements of good and bad present.  This is the point where we need to ask ourselves “Where and how is the great GOOD done?”

I can tell you from my time serving in the Air Force that there were times when I was afraid. 

There were, no doubt, times when Lewis, serving in the trenches in WWI, was undoubtedly afraid.  

Courage and fear would seem to naturally go together. 

But I think there is also on the battlefield elements of both courage and cowardice.  The question is which will win the day? 

The same is true in ethics.  An example, if someone comes to me for the Sacrament of Confession, whatever is said is protected by the Seal of the Confessional. 

But if someone confesses murder (which has never happened) do I report it to the authorities? 

The person is protected by the moral absolute of the Sanctity of the Confessional.  However, the Sanctity of Life is also a moral absolute.  You can see the ethical problems here.

Now obviously Screwtape and Wormwood have NO interest in ethics or morality, but you get my point. 

However, Lewis wants to point out that there are multiple considerations and ultimately it is the promise of God that prevails.  Even in the moment of our greatest weakness, God gives us the strength to go forward even when we are afraid.

Our first scripture lesson for today is an excellent example of courage even when we are afraid.   In the 3^rd chapter of Daniel we hear the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.  They are 3 Jewish young men caught up in the Babylonian Exile. 

Nebuchadnezzar II ruled the Neo-Babylonian Empire from 605 to 562 BC.  He is best known for conquering Jerusalem, destroying the Temple in 586 BC and taking many Jews into exile. 

When these 3 Jewish men refuse to bow down to a golden bull and worship the Babylonian god, Nebuchadnezzar has them thrown into the fiery furnace. 

However they do not die and instead are joined in the furnace by an angel who delivers them and Nebuchadnezzar proclaims that the God of Israel is all powerful.

Now in place of a Psalm for today we have Canticle 13 which is normally read during Morning Prayer Rite II.  A canticle is a hymn or song of praise from Biblical texts other than the Psalms. 

Canticle 13 is known as “A Song of Praise” inspired by the Song of the Three Young Men who just happen to be Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego – the 3 Jewish men from our reading from the OT book of Daniel.  It comes from the Apocryphal writing known as The Prayer of Azariah which is part of the Greek additions to Daniel.  Azariah is the Jewish translation of Abednego.

Our prayer for today is likewise an excellent example of courage as a gift from God.  Through the gifts of God’s mercy we ask for faith, hope, understanding and charity that we may serve God.

Let us pray:

Almighty God our heavenly Father, renew in us the gifts of your mercy; increase our faith, strengthen our hope, enlighten our understanding, widen our charity, and make us ready to serve you; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.