Tag: selfishness

The Iron-bound Prison of the Self

I’m a Protestant. I don’t believe in Purgatory. Yet I want to read Dante, so what can I do? Well, first, one can read Dante’s second volume of The Divine Comedy as a treatise that applies to this life also—God purges sin from our lives and we must respond properly. The second thing that helps me in this quest is that Dorothy Sayers, a writer I love, undertook to make a fresh translation of Dante back in the 1940s-1950s. It… Read more »

Friendship: The Least Jealous of Loves

In a letter to lifelong friend Arthur Greeves, C. S. Lewis expressed his deep appreciation for the blessing of true friendship. How highly did he value it? “Friendship is the greatest of worldly goods,” Lewis declared. “Certainly to me it is the chief happiness of life.” He continued with advice to young men who were contemplating where to live: “I think I shd. say, ‘sacrifice almost everything to live where you can be near your friends.’ I know I am… Read more »

Technology Is Not the Problem

Self-centeredness is not new. We see it as the reason for the Fall in the Garden, and it has been the root of all sin ever since. Is the new generation emerging into adulthood more self-centered than previous ones? It may be fashionable to say so, but perhaps modern selfishness is just exhibiting itself in different ways; the heart of man never changes without redemption through Christ. Our technological advancements showcase our selfishness more. Whereas in the past it was… Read more »

Lewis: Interrupting “Real Life”

Do you ever find yourself complaining to God about all those “things” that keep getting in the way of what you want your life to be? If only, we tell ourselves, all the distractions of life could be removed, we could really live. We even get quite spiritual about it and confidently assert we would be so much better Christians without all those distractions. In one of his letters to a friend, C. S. Lewis addressed this, calling out this… Read more »

Lewis: The Self-Centeredness of Hell

Modern man doesn’t like to talk much about hell, unless it’s in some fanciful movie creation where one doesn’t have to worry about its reality. The reason we avoid thinking about the possibility of hell can be traced back to our similar reluctance to consider seriously our sinfulness. And what bothers us the most, I believe, about the idea of sin is that we know the root of it is our self-centeredness. We like being self-focused; we feel justified in… Read more »

The Narcissistic President

It takes a special kind of narcissism—a particularly virulent strain—to see the awful effects of one’s policies and continue not only to spout falsehoods about how wonderful those policies are, but to keep blaming someone else for the problems one has caused. Barack Obama has practically created his own brand of narcissism, a malady seldom seen in this strength. Narcissism is really just another name for supreme selfishness, which is the root of all sin. The medical field, though, shies… Read more »

The Rot Doesn’t Start at the Top

Have you ever felt like this: so sickened by the ocean of dishonesty, lack of integrity, and arrogance of the majority of humanity that you just want to seal yourself off from the ugliness of it all? If not for the mercy I’ve received personally from the Lord, and His forgiveness for my own past dishonesty, lack of integrity, and arrogance, I would be tempted to find a nice isolated corner of the world where I could simply let the… Read more »