At Her Center Where Her Truest Children Dwell—Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis

Crosses of Different Christian Denominations

"One of the things Christians are disagreed about is the importance of their disagreements," observes C.S. Lewis as he continues to lay a foundation in his preface to Mere Christianity.  "When two Christians of different denominations start arguing, it is usually not long before one asks whether such-and-such a point 'really matters' and the other replies:  'Matter? Why, it's absolutely essential!'" Lewis's own experience, however, is this: "I have met with little of the fabled odium theologicum from convinced members of communions different from my own.  Hostility has come more from borderline people whether within the Church of England [Lewis's denomination] or without it:  men not exactly obedient to any communion.  This I find curiously consoling. It is at her centre, where her truest children dwell, that each communion is really closest to one another in spirit, if not in doctrine.  And this suggests that at the centre of each there is a something, or a Someone, who against all divergences of belief, all differences of temperament, all memories of mutual persecution, speaks with the same voice."

Highlights from the Preface to Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. Click here for a clear view of how this Preface relates to the whole book.

Multiple times I have experienced this unifying truth Lewis speaks of through the saints of many denominations that have nourished me in my Christian pilgrimage:

• Having been led to Christ out of a non-religious background my senior year at Hollywood High January 27, 1977 principally through the faithful witness of fellow students Robin Rochelle Price (of the Church of God in Christ under Bishop Charles E. Blake) and Deanna (Deckert) McCoy.
• Having been baptized in the summer of 1977 by a godly USC college student, Samuel Lam, of the Local Church cult under Witness Lee, an errant disciple of China's mystical but orthodox Watchman Nee.  This was the first church I attended as a Christian because I was offered a ride there by fellow Hollywood High Christian students Deanna Deckert and Benjamin Hsu.  One of the first questions I asked them was, "Now that I'm a Christian, aren't I supposed to be going to church?" 
• Having spent my freshman year (1977-78) at a Roman Catholic college, Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas (my dad's hometown; I got a scholarship there). I seriously contemplated joining the Order of St. Benedict (O.S.B.) nuns.
• Having spent my sophomore and junior years (1978-80) ministering with and being trained by Campus Crusade for Christ (CRU student ministry) at the University of California at Irvine while attending an American Baptist Church near campus.
• Having attended and graduated from the Logos Bible Institute on the campus of the non-denominational Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, CA under Pastor John MacArthur, earning a Certificate in Bible in 1981.
• Having finished my B.A. in History/Classical Civilization at UCLA in 1983 while ministering with Bruin Christian Fellowship (part of IVCF, InterVarsity Christian Fellowship).
• Having worked for Pastor John's Grace to You ministry as a book editor from 1984-1993 full time and freelance since then.
• Having worshiped from 1994-97 at Pacific Hills Church in Aliso Viejo, a Charismatic Calvary Chapel satellite under Pastor Danny Bond, one of Pastor John's disciples.
• Having attended non-denominational Grace Bible Church in Mt. Laurel, NJ from 1997-2002.
• Having become members of Fellowship Bible Church in Methuen, MA from 2002-2011 and our children attending Fellowship Christian Academy from 2002-2015 and my volunteering at FCA throughout that time.
• Having been—and still!—an avid listener of Pastor R.C. Sproul's Reformed theological teachings on his Renewing Your Mind broadcast and many other Ligonier Ministries podcasts, such as Simply Put, 5 Minutes in Church History, and Luther in Real Time.

• Becoming members of Merrimack Valley (Orthodox) Presbyterian Church in North Andover, MA with my husband and children in May of 2011 when we decided we wanted to be part of a Reformed church to reflect our beliefs in the key Reformation doctrines.
• Becoming regular attenders of Island Pond Baptist Church in Hampstead, NH (Southern Baptist Convention) in August of 2013 when we realized we are more Reformed Baptist in our convictions (but not to the point of insisting on immersion for baptism) and see the value of New Covenant theology. 
• Becoming a regular subscriber of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary president Dr. Albert Mohler's insightful email news analyses, The Briefing and later to The World and Everything in It podcast of news from a broad Christian point of view.
• Being led through providential events to West Congregational Church in Haverhill, MA in June of 2014. 
• Starting to attend Grace Community Church in Chelmsford, MA in September of 2015.
• Being led to New England Bible Church closer to home in March of 2016, where I taught a Sunday School class to kids from grades 1-6 on Dr. Luke's writings and then a 3-year through-the-Bible approach called The Gospel Project. In 2016 I also became one of the teachers in NEBC's free English as a Second Language program for adults.
• Being led further from home in July of 2020 to a sister church of our beloved Grace Community Church in L.A., where my husband and I met and married, and then back to a dear church we attended before closer to home in November of 2022. 
• Attending and ministering at our son and daughter-in-law's church in Columbia, MD, Hope Bible Church, when we move to that area around August of 2024.
• We keep living and learning and loving with a wonderful variety of fellow Christians!

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Serving Where the Line Is Thinnest—Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis

The Thin Line on Little Round Top at Gettysburg:

What If Those Guys Weren't There?

C.S. Lewis explains what kind of book he is writing in his preface to Mere Christianity.  It was born from a series of BBC radio addresses he was asked to give to a nation at war, to people facing death daily and wanting clear thinking on matters that matter.

"Ever since I became a Christian," Lewis writes, "I have thought that the best, perhaps the only, service I could do for my unbelieving neighbors was to explain and defend the belief that has been common to nearly all Christians at all times.... I got the impression that far more, and more talented, authors were ... engaged in ... controversial matters than in the defense of what [Richard] Baxter calls 'mere' Christianity.  That part of the line where I thought I could serve best was also the part that seemed to be thinnest.  And to it I naturally went."  

"The reader should be warned that I offer no help to anyone who is hesitating between two Christian denominations. You will not learn from me whether you ought to become an Anglican, a Methodist, a Presbyterian, or a Roman Catholic. This omission is intentional (even in the list I have just given the order is alphabetical). There is no mystery about my own position. I am a very ordinary layman of the Church of England.... I am not writing to expound something I could call 'my religion,' but to expound 'mere' Christianity, which is what it is and what it was long before I was born and whether I like it or not. Some people draw unwarranted conclusions from the fact that I never say more about the Blessed Virgin Mary than is involved in asserting the Virgin Birth of Christ. But surely my reason for not doing so is obvious? To say more would take me at once into highly controversial regions. And there is no controversy between Christians that needs to be so delicately touched as this. The Roman Catholic beliefs on that subject are held not only with the ordinary fervor that attaches to all sincere religious belief, but (very naturally) with the peculiar and, as it were, chivalrous sensibility that a man feels when the honor of his mother or his beloved is at stake. It is very difficult so to dissent from them that you will not appear to them a cad as well as a heretic. And contrariwise, the opposed Protestant beliefs on this subject call forth feelings that go down to the very root of all Monotheism. To radical Protestants it seems that the distinction between Creator and creature (however holy) is imperiled: that Polytheism is risen again. Hence it is hard so to dissent from them that you will not appear something worse than a heretic—a Pagan or idolater. If any topic could be relied upon to wreck a book about 'mere' Christianity—if any topic makes utterly unprofitable reading for those who do not yet believe that the Virgin's son is God—surely this is it.

"Ever since I served as an infantryman in the First World War I have had a great dislike of people who, themselves in ease and safety, issue exhortations to men in the front line.  As a result I have a reluctance to say much about temptations to which I myself am not exposed.... I did not think it my place to take a firm line about pains, dangers and expenses from which I am protected; having no pastoral office that obliged me to do so."  Imagine how much grief and unnecessary offense such humility avoids! Humility is a virtue I find rare among the most intelligent people I know in person or through their writings.  Indeed, "knowledge puffs up" (1 Corinthians 8:1) or has that tendency, but it can be derailed. C.S. Lewis, his dear friend J.R.R. Tolkien, and other gifted authors help show us how.

Highlights from the Preface to Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. Click here for a clear view of how this Preface relates to the whole book.

Tolkien and Lewis: A Friendship That Changed My Life

A Blessed Friendship

Jesus healed ten lepers at once but only one came back to thank Him (Luke 17:11-19). That thankful fellow has been an inspiration to me since I first read about him. Before launching into C.S. Lewis's witty, wise, and wonderful preface to Mere Christianity, I want to demonstrate my thanks for a great friendship that literally changed my life—even though I was not one of the friends involved. The story of how J.R.R. Tolkien helped lead C.S. Lewis to Christ is so important, I have volunteered to lecture on the subject since 2004 to high-school students at my children's school so they graduate knowing more than the mere paragraph devoted to those literary giants in their textbook. Here is an illustrated version of that lecture as a blog post: 

A Tale of Two Lieutenants: C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien...

What a debt I owe to Tolkien for befriending Lewis—I plan to personally thank him in heaven!  That friendship made Mere Christianity, The Lord of the Rings, and a host of other spiritually enriching books available to help people fall in love with the Lord Jesus Christ and know and serve Him better.  My main strength as a writer is in editing so be looking for succinct excerpts of treasure troves such as those that I hope will whet your appetite for more.

"Mere Christianity" As a Friend

I began this blog by explaining the origin of my journal.  Anything with a title as lofty as Allacin's Book of What Is Important, Wise, and Truly Worth Knowing (shortened to a blog-friendly length) cries out for some justification to the humble mind—or at least to a mind that prizes humility as a virtue.  My journal was born when caring for my daughter, and arises from love for my children and their friends.  Why burden them, or anyone else, with anything less than what is truly worth reading?  I rightly began my truly-worth-knowings with A Favorite Verse of Holy Scripture and A Favorite Sermon because of this overarching truth under my name that has long been part of every e-mail I send:

 Allacin Morimizu

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge;

fools despise wisdom and instruction" (Proverbs 1:7).

I didn't begin my life with any appreciation for Scripture or sermons but both have shaped my life since becoming a Christian at age seventeen.  That story unfolds over time in my journal, but today's post is on My Favorite Book (other than the Holy Bible).  Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis has been a faithful friend since I discovered it in a bookstore when working during the summer of 1978 between my freshman and sophomore years of college.  Why?  Because of how it nurtured my new faith and how clearly it explains Christianity to outsiders like me.  (It clarifies things for insiders as well who missed a few crucial points growing up in Christian surroundings.)  For my birthday last November, a few weeks before starting my journal, I purchased Mere Christianity audio CDs and listen to them as eagerly as I listen to a wise, beloved friend.  Like a friend this book has its flaws but I will focus on what in it rings true with Scripture and with what I have experienced in life.

PS. A few years later, I changed my e-mail farewell to:

Allacin Morimizu

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge" (Proverbs 1:7)
http://allacin.blogspot.com/
Illustrated Summaries of Christian Classics