We've been hearing about the "Christmas wars" . . . now here come the "Narnia wars." Recently, in the Guardian, Polly Toynbee wrote ("Narnia represents everything that is most hateful about religion"):
Most British children will be utterly clueless about any message beyond the age-old mythic battle between good and evil. Most of the fairy story works as well as any Norse saga, pagan legend or modern fantasy, so only the minority who are familiar with Christian iconography will see Jesus in the lion. After all, 43% of people in Britain in a recent poll couldn't say what Easter celebrated. Among the young - apart from those in faith schools - that number must be considerably higher. Ask art galleries: they now have to write the story of every religious painting on the label as people no longer know what "agony in the garden", "deposition", "transfiguration" or "ascension" mean. This may be regrettable cultural ignorance, but it means Aslan will stay just a lion to most movie-goers.
Can it really be true that "43% of people in Britain . . . couldn't say what Easter celebrated"? Or, am I off-base in being so surprised? In any event, after re-capping the story of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Toynbee says (among other . . . bracing things):
Over the years, [many] have had uneasy doubts about the Narnian brand of Christianity. Christ should surely be no lion (let alone with the orotund voice of Liam Neeson). He was the lamb, representing the meek of the earth, weak, poor and refusing to fight. Philip Pullman - he of the marvellously secular trilogy His Dark Materials - has called Narnia "one of the most ugly, poisonous things I have ever read".
Hmm. I wonder why Ms. Toynbee is so confident that Christ should "surely" be no lion. (In any event -- and she might not know this -- there is "lamb" imagery in the third Narnia book, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader). By the way, there is (I think) a "law point" here: As we see time and again, one challenge in enforcing a constitutional prohibition on "endorsements" or "establishments" of religion is identifying precisely what it is that certain symbols or symbolic acts mean, and to whom? But back to Toynbee:
[H]ere in Narnia is the perfect Republican, muscular Christianity for America - that warped, distorted neo-fascist strain that thinks might is proof of right. . . . The godly will reap earthly reward because God is on the side of the strong. This appears to be CS Lewis's view, too. In the battle at the end of the film, visually a great epic treat, the child crusaders are crowned kings and queens for no particular reason. Intellectually, the poor do not inherit Lewis's earth.
Does any of this matter? Not really. Most children will never notice. But adults who wince at the worst elements of Christian belief may need a sickbag handy for the most religiose scenes. The Guardian film critic Peter Bradshaw gives the film five stars and says, "There is no need for anyone to get into a PC huff about its Christian allegory." Well, here's my huff.
Lewis said he hoped the book would soften-up religious reflexes and "make it easier for children to accept Christianity when they met it later in life". Holiness drenches the Chronicles. When, in the book, the children first hear someone say, mysteriously, "Aslan is on the move", he writes: "Now a very curious thing happened. None of the children knew who Aslan was any more than you do; but the moment the Beaver had spoken these words everyone felt quite different. Perhaps it has sometimes happened to you in a dream that someone says something which you don't understand but in the dream it feels as if it had enormous meaning ..." So Lewis weaves his dreams to invade children's minds with Christian iconography that is part fairytale wonder and joy - but heavily laden with guilt, blame, sacrifice and a suffering that is dark with emotional sadism.
Children are supposed to fall in love with the hypnotic Aslan, though he is not a character: he is pure, raw, awesome power. He is an emblem for everything an atheist objects to in religion. His divine presence is a way to avoid humans taking responsibility for everything here and now on earth, where no one is watching, no one is guiding, no one is judging and there is no other place yet to come. Without an Aslan, there is no one here but ourselves to suffer for our sins, no one to redeem us but ourselves: we are obliged to settle our own disputes and do what we can. We need no holy guide books, only a very human moral compass. Everyone needs ghosts, spirits, marvels and poetic imaginings, but we can do well without an Aslan.
I suppose it is always good to encounter and engage views that seem so alien (and, to me, mean-spirited). I'm one of those who loved (and loves) the Narnia stories. (And, I prefer -- I admit -- Aslan to the cheesy "Jesus as my baseball teammate" pictures that some kids had when I was growing up). But, it is clear that I read very different books -- beautiful, evocative, mysterious, romantic, life-affirming, humanist books -- than did Ms. Toynbee.
For a different take, by the way, check out Michael Nelson's piece in The Chronicle Review ("For the Love of Narnia"), which responds to Pullman and other Narnia-critics.
Saturday, December 10, 2005
[Anyone interested in continuing this discussion? I posted these comments just before Thanksgiving.]
Thanks to Rick, Tom, and Patrick for their comments.
This is what I have learned from
E. Christian Brugger, who wrote his book—Capital
Punishment and Roman Catholic Moral Tradition (Notre Dame, 2003)--under the
watchful eye of no less a master than John Finnis.
1. The traditional position of the Roman Catholic Church has been that one
may never intentionally kill an *innocent* human being.
2. John Paul II’s position was more radical: One may never intentionally kill a human being. The “innocent” has dropped out.
3.
Why may one never intentionally kill any human being (according to John
Paul)? Because to do so is to act contrary to the charity we are called
to have for every human being.
4. To execute a criminal under a system of capital punishment is
intentionally to kill a human being—something that John Paul’s position does
not allow. (Intentionally to kill a
human being--and, so, to execute a criminal--if it is not necessary to do so
for reasons of self-defense is not to treat the human being lovingly.)
5. The Church’s (i.e., the
magisterium’s) position on capital punishment is in a state of
transition—and, as it now stands, is incoherent. The
Catechism tells us that the state may use capital punishment only
if
necessary to do so for reasons of self-defense. Why incoherent?
Because to engage in a legitimate act of self-defense is never
intentionally to kill a human being, but to execute a criminal is
always intentionally to kill a human being.
As I said, this is what I learned
from Brugger’s book. I wish that Rick,
Patrick, Tom, and I—and anyone else interested—could read the book together in
a discussion group. What a fruitful
discussion that would be!
As Rick knows, my own views on
capital punishment do not presuppose that John Paul was right in his belief
that one may never intentionally kill a human being. But that’s a story for another day.
Finally, about the retributive
theory of punishment. I stand by what I
said in my earlier posting. Having read
Patrick’s posting, it seems that I stand with Michael Moore on this.
But let’s move past that point to
the following inquiry: I assume that
Rick and Patrick do not believe that the retributive theory of punishment could
justify torturing a criminal (i.e., torturing him as punishment, not as a
method of interrogation). Why, then,
should we think that the retributive theory could justify executing a criminal? Is it because torturing him necessarily
violates his inherent dignity but executing him does not? (If so, it would seem that the inherent
dignity of every human being is a limit on what would otherwise be justifiable
according to the retributive theory, yes?) But why does executing him not violate his inherent dignity?
Rick’s suggestion (in an e-mail to
me) is this: “[An adequate]
justification [for capital punishment is] supplied by the need to communicate
adequately the magnitude of [the convict’s] wrong and to redress the disorder
caused by his offense.” But I suspect
that few of us would agree that of the available punishments for even the most
depraved crimes, only capital punishment
can “communicate adequately the magnitude of the wrong and redress the disorder
caused by the offense.” Have all the
jurisdictions that have forsaken capital punishment—Michigan,
for example, or England—thereby
forsaken their only means of
communicating adequately the magnitude of the wrong and of redressing the
disorder caused by the offense? Is that
a plausioble position? Is it plausible
to believe that the only way to restore the disorder caused by some heinous
murders is by killing—executing—the murderers? Isn’t it at least as plausible to believe that killing the murderers obscures the magnitude of the wrong they
did rather than communicates it, by obscuring the value of human life—of every human life? That is the position of the United States
Conference of Catholic Bishops in their recent statement of opposition to the
death penalty.
So,
I agree with Michael Moore and
disagree with Rick and Patrick on the retributive theory of punishment.
But even if I were to agree with Rick and
Patrick on that issue, I would still disagree with their claim that the
retributive
theory of punishment can justify capital punishment. I agree with the
bishops' (implicit) claim, in their recent statement, that it cannot.
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