PWJ: S4E24 – TSL 13 – “Cup of brown joy”

Wormwood messes up by allowing the patient to experience some real pleasures! Matt sits down with Rev. Brian McGreevy to discuss Screwtape’s advice to his nephew…

S4E24: “Cup of Brown Joy” (Download)

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Timestamps

00:00 – Entering “The Eagle & Child”…
00:13 – Welcome
00:41 – Rev. Brian McGreevy
04:35 – Quote-of-the-week
05:01 – Drink-of-the-week
06:03 – Patreon Toast
06:25 – Chapter Summary
07:15 – Discussion
50:56 – “Last Call” Bell and Unscrewing Screwtape
54:38 – McGreevy Podcasts
56:12 – Closing Remarks

YouTube Version

The YouTube version of today’s episode:

After Show Skype Session

Today’s “After Hours” session was devoted to discussing the song-of-the-week, Cup of Brown Joy by Professor Elemental:

Show Notes

Opening Chit-Chat

• Matt shared some biographical information about his guest co-host, Rev Brian who first appeared on the show in S3E35:

Father Brian is Assistant to the Rector for Hospitality Ministry at the historic St. Philip’s Church in Charleston, South Carolina, which was founded in 1680. He is married to his wife, Jane, and they have four children. He began by studying law at Emory University and worked at an international finance and insurance trade association for over 15 years, becoming the Managing Director International. He and his wife later went on to run a Bed & Breakfast, and subsequently he felt a call to join the priesthood in the Anglican church. He has recorded several podcasts about C.S. Lewis and currently he is teaching through the book we discussed in Season 1, Mere Christianity.

Biographical information about Rev. Brian McGreevy

• Matt spoke about Screwtape tempting us away from goodness, as well as the development of habits.

Song-of-the-week

• Matt omitted any reference to the song-of-the-week which was the very bizarre Cup of Brown Joy by Professor Elemental:

Quote-of-the-week

• The quote-of-the-week is…

“You should always try to make the patient abandon the people or food or books he really likes in favour of the “best” people, the “right” food, the “important” books.”

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (Letter #13)

Drink-of-the-week

• The drink-of-the-week is That Boutiquey Whisky Company 6 Year single:
  • Color: Clearish yellow
  • Nose: Very fruity with some toffee/malty
  • Palette: Fruit but not as much as the nose…more the sweet of honey/toffee
  • Finish: good length

Patreon Toast

• One of the benefits for Gold-level supporters on Patreon is that we toast one of them each episode. Today we are toasting Brittany:

You have been incredible in the Slack Community and can’t thank you enough for all your help and support of the ministry. We raise a glass to the Cloud of grace coming around you in your times of need!

Toast for Brittany

Chapter Summary

• Letter #13, which was first published in The Guardian on July 25th, 2941 and here is my 100-word summary:

Wormwood is in trouble! The patient seems to have had a renewal in his faith, resulting in a spiritual asphyxiating cloud which has protected him from Wormwood’s attacks.

Wormwood’s crucial mistake was to allow the patient some real pleasures: a nice walk alone in beautiful surroundings, a cup of tea, and an enjoyable book. Screwtape says that these provided a touchstone of reality. Hell wants the man to never enjoy things for themselves, but only because the world tells him they are fashionable.

Screwtape closes by emphasizing that it is paramount that the patient not act upon this recent reconversion.

One hundred word summary of Letter #13

Discussion

Wormwood in trouble

• Before diving into the letter, Matt reminded us that in the last letter, the Patient was on a slow and steady path away from the light and toward Nothing! Screwtape had him in this perfect balance of feeling a sense of uneasiness that led to guilt/shame and pushed him away from the Enemy, but not enough to cause a repentance. As we will see in this letter, the situation has changed drastically and that balance of uneasiness must have gotten away from Wormwood:

The long and the short of it is that you have let the man slip through your fingers. The situation is very grave, and I really see no reason why I should try to shield you from the consequences of your inefficiency. A repentance and renewal of what the other side call “grace” on the scale which you describe is a defeat of the first order. It amounts to a second conversion — and probably on a deeper level than the first.

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (Letter #13)

• To explain Screwtape’s reference to a deeper conversion, Rev. McGreevy referenced Jesus’ words:

Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much; but he who is forgiven little, loves little.

Luke 7:47

• Screwtape mentions an “asphyxiating cloud” which has hindered Wormwood:

As you ought to have known, the asphyxiating cloud which prevented your attacking the patient on his walk back from the old mill, is a well-known phenomenon. It is the Enemy’s most barbarous weapon, and generally appears when He is directly present to the patient under certain modes not yet fully classified. Some humans are permanently surrounded by it and therefore inaccessible to us.

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (Letter #13)

This cloud re-appears in Letter #22. Fr. Brian also alluded to something similar in That Hideous Strength and pointed to Paul’s passage in Ephesians about The Armour of God:

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore take the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore, having girded your loins with truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the equipment of the gospel of peace; above all taking the shield of faith, with which you can quench all the flaming darts of the evil one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Pray at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, and also for me, that utterance may be given me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains; that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak.

Ephesians 6:10-20

• Matt also referred to the “cloud of witnesses” in Hebrews 12:

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before you…

Hebrews 12:1

Wormwood’s blunders

• Screwtape begins enumerating Wormwood’s blunders, which all relate to the patient encountering real simple pleasures:

And now for your blunders. On your own showing you first of all allowed the patient to read a book he really enjoyed, because he enjoyed it and not in order to make clever remarks about it to his new friends. In the second place, you allowed him to walk down to the old mill and have tea there — a walk through country he really likes, and taken alone. In other words you allowed him two real positive Pleasures. Were you so ignorant as not to see the danger of this? The characteristic of Pains and Pleasures is that they are unmistakably real, and therefore, as far as they go, give the man who feels them a touchstone of reality. 

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (Letter #13)

In describing these good things, Rev McGreevy quoted St. Paul:

Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

Philippians 4:8

Not to be outdone, Matt spoke about what St. Thomas Aquinas had to say about combatting despair in Question 38 of the Summa.

The issue of pleasure will return in Letter #22.

• Screwtape explains what these pleasures end up doing in the patient:

…it would peel off from his sensibility the kind of crust you have been forming on it, and make him feel that he was coming home, recovering himself? As a preliminary to detaching him from the Enemy, you wanted to detach him from himself, and had made some progress in doing so. Now, all that is undone.

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (Letter #13)

Rev. McGreevy quoted both The Weight of Glory and St. Paul:

…it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.

C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory

For freedom Christ has set us free; stand fast therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

Galatians 5:1

A different kind of detachment

• Screwtape explains that God wants us to be detached, but in a different way:

Of course I know that the Enemy also wants to detach men from themselves, but in a different way. Remember always, that He really likes the little vermin, and sets an absurd value on the distinctness of every one of them. When He talks of their losing their selves, He only means abandoning the clamour of self-will; once they have done that, He really gives them back all their personality, and boasts (I am afraid, sincerely) that when they are wholly His they will be more themselves than ever.

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (Letter #13)

• He wants the patient to be least like himself:

The deepest likings and impulses of any man are the raw material, the starting-point, with which the Enemy has furnished him. 

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (Letter #13)

Rev. McGreevy quoted the Early Church Father, St. Irenaeus:

Gloria Dei est vivens homo (Latin)
The glory of God is man fully alive (English)

St. Irenaeus, Against Heresies

He also alluded to Tolkien’s poem, Mythopoeia:

…man, sub-creator, the refracted light
through whom is splintered from a single
White to many hues, and endlessly combined
in living shapes that move from mind to mind.

J.R.R. Tolkien, Mythopoeia

He also referenced the movie Chariots of Fire:

God made me fast and when I run, I feel his pleasure’

Eric Liddell

He also referenced the Mr. Bean movie:

• It turns out that even our simple likes can be a strong defence against Screwtape’s attacks:

You should always try to make the patient abandon the people or food or books he really likes in favour of the “best” people, the “right” food, the “important” books. I have known a human defended from strong temptations to social ambition by a still stronger taste for tripe and onions.

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (Letter #13)

Rev. McCreevy referred to Bright Young Things. Matt talked about mimetic desire and Brian referred to the epistle to the Romans:

I appeal to you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Romans 12:1-2

Damage Control

• Screwtape explains how to do damage control:

It remains to consider how we can retrieve this disaster. The great thing is to prevent his doing anything. As long as he does not convert it into action, it does not matter how much he thinks about this new repentance. Let the little brute wallow in it. Let him, if he has any bent that way, write a book about it; that is often an excellent way of sterilising the seeds which the Enemy plants in a human soul. Let him do anything but act. No amount of piety in his imagination and affections will harm us if we can keep it out of his will. As one of the humans has said, active habits are strengthened by repetition but passive ones are weakened. The more often he feels without acting, the less he will be able ever to act, and, in the long run, the less he will be able to feel.

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (Letter #13)

Rev McGreevy referred to The Common Rule by Justin Earley, as well as Joseph Butler:

… (1) that practical habits are formed and strengthened by repeated acts, and (2) that passive impressions grow weaker by being repeated upon us; it must follow, that active habits may be gradually forming and strengthening, by a course of acting upon such and such motives and excitements, whilst these motives and excitements themselves are, by proportionable degrees, growing less sensible; i. e. are continually less and less sensibly felt, even as the active habits strengthen.”

Joseph Butler (1692-1752), The Analogy of Religion (1736),

Screwtape Unscrewed

1. Do: repent and turn to God when you’re in a downturn
2. Do: embrace true pleasures, truth, goodness, and beauty
3. Do: act!

Rev. Brian McGreevy

• You can find Brian’s podcasts on Apple and on his church’s website.
  • C.S. Lewis and the Christian Life
  • C.S. Lewis and The Screwtape Letters
  • The Fellowship: Lewis, Tolkien and the Inklings
  • Mere Christianity: Timely truth for a hurting world

Providence eLearning