Pedantia Christianus

I love CS Lewis, but he is fettered by a nagging, obtuse refusal to look outside of a black and white universe. He anthropomorphizes good and evil and, in doing so, externalizes the shadow self, the unloved aspects of the human soul that we all try so desperately to distance ourselves from and deny. Christianity as a whole seems plagued by the practice of sanctification, of removing the dross and chaff when there really is no way to remove these aspects of ourselves without essentially performing a spiritual lobotomy. We are woefully incomplete without the unloved, shadow aspects of self. Good and evil exist within the souls of every living thing. Positive and negative aspects of creation move in perfect accordance within both micro and macro systems throughout the cosmos. Both exist only in relation to one another. Both are essential for creation to distill into material reality.

We cannot dispel or destroy the negative aspects of ourselves without obliterating ourselves in the process. We can, however, strive to achieve equilibrium between light and dark through the practice of moderation. Moderation suggests experiential knowledge of all things at a moderate level….abstinence isn’t moderation anymore than indulgence…

Externalization of the shadow aspects of our own soul is, essentially, shirking responsibility for them. Assigning an external, anthropomorphic form to them and assigning responsibility for our salvation, actions and happiness to these forms represents complete and total subjugation to an external locus of control. It is voluntary servitude…slavery…the very opposite of self actualization and enlightenment.