There are two weeks left in the semester, and I’ve been writing papers. Not to belabor a point that I have probably beaten to death already, but writing in the evangelical Christian voice is not my favorite thing. I was reminded of this quote from C.S. Lewis, talking about his ease of writing in the diabolical voice for The Screwtape Letters:
Though I had never written anything more easily, I never wrote with less enjoyment. The ease came, no doubt, from the fact that the device of diabolical letters, once you have thought of it, exploits itself spontaneously… It would run away with you for a thousand pages if you gave it its head. But though it was easy to twist one’s mind into the diabolical [evangelical] attitude, it was not fun, or not for long. The strain produced a sort of spiritual cramp. The work into which I had to project myself while I spoke through Screwtape was all dust, grit, thirst, and itch. Every trace of beauty, freshness, and geniality [critical thinking, truthfulness to my nonbelief, any trace of my actual self] had to be excluded. It almost smothered me before I was done. It would have smothered my readers if I had prolonged it.
(from the Preface to the 1961 edition of The Screwtape Letters)
The fact that I remembered some random portion of a preface to The Screwtape Letters while writing final papers probably tells you what kind of Christian (or what kind of Wheaton student) I was– the kind who was constantly reading or re-reading one C.S. Lewis book or another. Anyway, I remember that when I read The Screwtape Letters as a Christian, I had the same kind of reaction as a reader that Lewis said he had as a writer– I really liked it, but there was still something about it that crept under my skin and made me feel depressed. Like a good dead baby joke. (Yeah, I’m an atheist. I like dead babies.)
I wonder if my professors can tell, when I write in the evangelical voice, that it’s not my real voice. So much of evangelical culture is like that anyway, requiring fluency in the language, that they probably can’t. Like people who stand up and raise their arms during worship at all-school communion– some of them are just regurgitating choreography. But you can never tell.
Insightful analogy. I think you can be an incredible witness to Christians should you ever choose to be.
Wait 🙂 We are on the internet; I guess you already are.
I stumbeled across your site recently and in some of the other posts you wrote you also mentioned having to write from a Christian voice, do you really have to write that way? (I’m serious in that question). I went to Calvin a couple years back and there you could write from a Christian voice but it was far from required and so really I’m just surprised (and disappointed) that Wheaton would have such a stipulation. But then again, despite the similarities between Wheaton and Calvin there are some decidely marked differences between the schools and perhaps this is just one of them.
And on something that may not be worth it (especially at this stage) if Wheaton does have such a stipulation could you get around it by informing your profs. of your present views? (This may involve way far too much emotional work as well as putting your anominity at risk but it would be a work around). Anyway, for what that’s worth…. And sorry you can’t write from your true voice, that sucks.
Based on my experiebceI don’t think they’ll notice you’re ‘faking it’.
I thought someone would notice I was during the time when I was inwardly very skeptical but kept going to church and Bible study and saying the right answers.
If someone had noticed that might have made me wonder if God revealed it to them – and shaken my skepticism.
But no-one did.
I appreciated this blog. It helps me articulate my own past experiences more clearly.