Weight

There’s a line from ‘Good Will Hunting’ where Matt Damon is in Robin William’s office looking at the books on his shelf. He comes across a history book, remarks that it’s one of the “wrong f#cking books”, and then comments, “You want to read a real history read [so and so’s People’s History], that book will knock you on your ass.” Good Will Hunting is among my favorite movies, and I’ve always loved this line for how well it articulates that feeling. I’ve only read a few books that knocked me on my ass, but I’ve just finished one and I pass it along with Will’s exhortation.
C.S. Lewis has been one of my favorite authors since I was a child, and my mother used to read “The Chronicles of Narnia” to me early in the mornings before school. In the last few years I’ve spent much more time with his non-fiction writings; Mere Christianity is simply extraordinary. The depth of the man’s thought and insight, and the way he asks so many of the ‘right questions’, is staggering.
After MC, I didn’t think I could be as impressed with any of his other works, and then I read ‘The Abolition of Man’; only one other book in my collection has as many highlightings and underlines as this one. So after Abolition, I REALLY didn’t think he’d have any more tricks to impress me with.
I should have known better.
I just finished reading ‘The Weight of Glory’, which is a collection of sermons and addresses he delivered, most of them during WWII. Incredible. It’s been some time since a book knocked me on my ass, but this one did. The copy of ‘Weight’ that I read (checked out here from the university library, which I have found to be extraordinarily well-stocked) was an old one and contains only five sermons, as compared to the nine included in the most recent printing you’d buy off Amazon. Of those five, one is a bit mediocre, three are excellent, but it is the first and title sermon that really packs the punch. I won’t spoil it for anyone who takes the time to read it, but I highly recommend it. It isn’t long; you could even take 20-30 minutes, pull a copy off the shelf at a local bookstore and read it there.
One of the really interesting ideas I’ve encountered while being here in New York is that in the Old Testament, the Jewish Tanakh, the word for ‘glory’ carries this meaning or connotation of weight. Which makes a lot of straightforward sense, at least to me. And that’s part of why Lewis’ sermon is so impressive and aptly named, because it takes that weight and slams it into you, and makes you realize something (if you follow and concur with his thinking) that is so central to everything that it’s amazing.
It’s worth the read.
Oh, and those other posts from Spring Break? Don't worry, they're coming ...