Ch. 7: Membership

In this chapter, Lewis looks at the trend toward collectivism and the elimination of true solitude (a trend which has continued, obviously). He addresses the paradoxical nature of faith, in that it is both public and private, and encourages us to not simply allow cultural trends to dictate our spiritual lives. He also looks at the true nature of membership for believers and discusses the sentiment that people are equal.

On collectivism:

"Even on those rare occasions when a modern undergraduate is not attending some such society he is seldom engaged in those solitary walks, or walks with a single companion, which built the minds of the previous generations. He lives in a crowd; caucus has replaced friendship."

"There is a crowd of busybodies, self-appointed masters of ceremonies, whose life is devoted to destroying solitude wherever solitude still exists."

"We live, in fact, in a world starved for solitude, silence , and privacy, and therefore starved for meditation and true friendship."

On true membership:

"The society into which the Christian is called at baptism is not a collective but a Body. It is in fact that Body of which the family is an image on the natural level."

"We are summoned from the outset to combine as creatures with our Creator, as mortals with immortal, as redeemed sinners with sinless Redeemer."

"The sacrifice of selfish privacy which is daily demanded of us is daily repaid a hundredfold in the true growth of personality which the life of the Body encourages. Those who are members of one another become as diverse as the hand and the ear. That is why worldings are so monotonously alike compared with the almost fantastic variety of the saints."

"Obedience is the road to freedom, humility the road to pleasure, unity the road to personality."

On equality:

To be continued...