Tentpegs

In the same vein as the last blog, this question comes from the same individual, a chaplain in the US Army. I knew the Captain when he was a very young man and was thrilled when I heard he had gone on to get higher education and then volunteered to serve as a source of wisdom and comfort to our soldiers. I hope you will forgive me for moving his questions to the top of the pile. His question concerns a passage he found in The Screwtape Letters.

While Screwtape allows that war is “entertaining” and provides “legitimate and pleasing refreshment for our myriads of toiling workers,” he fears that “if we are not careful, we shall see thousands turning in this tribulation to the Enemy, while tens of thousands who do not go so far will nevertheless have their attentions diverted from themselves to causes which they believe to be higher than the self.” Why would war have this effect? How does or can war alter human consciousness in a way unfavorable to temptation? Do you think this is as true today as in Lewis’ day? How would you relate Lewis’s own experience in WWI, which apparently confirmed his youthful atheism, to his position in The Screwtape Letters?

War is a crucible that distills, refines, destroys, reveals, and churns the human soul. It isn’t a movie nor is it the psychosis-generator that Hollywood portrays. In war, especially in a World War like the one that was grinding Europe into powder when this book was written, we have to face the best and worst in ourselves. Screwtape was warning Wormwood, a minor demon, that good or bad can come out of war. He was to watch his patient (the person he was going to tempt) very carefully.

It is a famous and true adage that no plan of battle survives the first shot. It is also true to say that most “heroes in their own mind” find their entire psyche rearranged after that first shot. When human beings are evaporated by artillery or eviscerated by shrapnel, we react in certain predictable ways (see www.killology.com for a website that studies this phenomena). We can decide that so much evil is in the world that there cannot be a god (or a loving god, or a powerful god, or a caring god), or we can react with horror at the sight of such evil and decide to be a force for good. We can cling to God or we can turn from Him (Duncan reported that, at Parris Island, everyone went to church. Even the atheists. That is normal). Some will put aside their selfishness and risk their lives for others (some in battle, and some as medics, chaplains). Some will pray in their trenches, show acts of kindness towards others, and show mercy to their captives. The devil hates that!

He wants to use war to make us doubt God, the existence of goodness in the human heart, the church, and order in our society. When some go into the crucible and come out with MORE faith… demons consider that tragic.

The reason war is such a powerful crucible is that it is an extreme event — and extreme events reveal who we really are and what we really believe far quicker than do the petty, faucet-dripping, annoyances of daily life. The devil does not want this war — which is very entertaining to his demons — to result in more people turning towards God or, even if they fail to do that, becoming selfless and heroic.

In fact, World War One and World War Two did much to weaker the church in Europe. While there are many stories of Christian faith and heroism, the general consensus is that the church failed the people in the years leading up to the war and it failed to speak up aggressively enough when fascism, socialism, class-ism, and myriad other “ism’s” pulled on their hobnailed boots for a march across the necks of the innocent. To this day, Christian churches are looked upon as weak and ineffective by the majority of Europeans… and it all began to go that way in WWI.

The devil didn’t have it all his own way, though. Liberty was restored, heroism was common, and the hand of God was visible in the overthrow of dictators and the emptying of the concentration camps. As it usually happens in time of war — some win but everybody loses.