{"id":71612,"date":"2019-07-04T07:00:52","date_gmt":"2019-07-04T14:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/?p=71612"},"modified":"2019-07-11T11:37:52","modified_gmt":"2019-07-11T18:37:52","slug":"c-s-lewis-on-suffering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/2019\/07\/04\/c-s-lewis-on-suffering\/","title":{"rendered":"C.S. Lewis on suffering"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

TO MARY VAN DEUSEN: On how one responds to the diagnosis of serious illness and on four strategies for coping<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

10 April 1959<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have just had Sister Hildegarde\u2019s letter. My heart goes out to you. You are now just where I was a little over two years ago\u2014they wrongly diagnosed Joy\u2019s condition as uremia before they discovered cancer of the bone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I know all the different ways in which it gets one: wild hopes, bitter nostalgia for lost happiness, mere physical terror turning one sick, agonised pity and self-pity. In fact, Gethsemane. I had one (paradoxical) support which you lack\u2014that of being in severe pain myself. Apart from that what helped Joy and me through it was:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1. That she was always told the whole truth about her own state<\/strong>.
There was no miserable pretence. That means that both can face it side-by-side, instead of becoming something like adversaries in a battle-of-wits. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

2. Take it day by day and hour by hour (as we took the front line)<\/strong>.
It is quite astonishing how many happy\u2014even gay\u2014moments we had together when there was no hope. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

3. Don\u2019t think of it as something sent<\/em> by God. <\/strong>
Death and disease are the work of the Devil. It is permitted<\/em> by God: i.e., our General has put you in a fort exposed to enemy fire. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

4. Remember other sufferers. <\/strong>
It\u2019s fatal to start thinking \u2018Why should this happen to us when everyone else is so happy.\u2019 You are (I was and may be again) one of a huge company. Of course we shall pray for you all we know how. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

God bless you both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis, Volume III<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

TO MARY VAN DEUSEN: On how one responds to the diagnosis of serious illness and on four strategies for coping. 10 April 1959 I have just had Sister Hildegarde\u2019s letter. My heart goes out to you. You are now just where I was a little over two years ago\u2014they wrongly diagnosed Joy\u2019s condition as uremia before they discovered cancer of the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[1914,927],"class_list":["post-71612","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faith","tag-c-s-lewis","tag-suffering"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71612"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71612\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72065,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71612\/revisions\/72065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}