Posted by Jack Ruddy on September 6th 2021

One of the classics of Christian writing, this book was originally given as a series of talks on the BBC during the course of the Second World War. This was obviously a time when people needed spiritual solace due to the horrific things taking place in the world and the number of families losing their loved ones. It was also a time when people needed to come together in the face of the common enemy. It seems partly for this reason that Lewis focussed on the basic tenets of Christianity, not getting bogged down into sectarian divisions over things like transubstantiation or the spiritual powers of the Pope.

You can tell that his chapters were given originally in small radio segments for a programme called Right & Wrong. They are quick to read and only argue one premise in each chapter. The structure works by each chapter building on what came before it so that a greater point can be tackled. It begins with a section on the law of human nature where Lewis argues that by and large, across history and civilisations, there tends to be a general morality common to all. This section seems to divide a lot of opinion. For those who agree with Lewis it shows the need for some external arbiter of right and wrong, and for those opposed to him they say this shows that it must be common because it works, and therefore any argument that any supernatural power is responsible is merely an attempt to come up with a comforting explanation. What Lewis doesn’t spell out explicitly and what those making the latter argument seem to miss is the possibility that a supernatural being created a system to work that way.

His chapter on the sin of pride is particularly illuminating, as Lewis explains that it is the fountainhead from which all the other sins spring up. For much of the first half of his book Lewis is not into the purely Christian realm, the issue of pride marks a decided split with other religions. Pride is competitive by its very nature in a way that other sins are not, in this way it will always cause enmity and drive people apart. Greed is perfectly capable of bringing people together. It is also more insidious than other sins because it can often be called upon to do good in another area. Lewis points out how teachers may appeal to a child’s pride to get them to behave better or work harder but for the good that is done their Pride has increased which may cause problems later. Reading this chapter made me see the final scene of the film Devil’s Advocate in a new light, the pride caused by Keanu Reeves character finally doing the right thing is actually going to doom him all over again.

Lewis wrote a number of other religious works, such as The Screwtape Letters and The Pilgrims Regress. The former sees a demon, Screwtape, writing letters to his nephew, a junior demon as he tries to tempt a man on earth into damnation. The latter is a clear allegory of Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress. It was written within a year of Lewis’ conversion and is an interesting view into the mind of a recent convert. Along the ‘regress’ characters such as Mr Enlightenment appear, who need to be navigated, whilst the Pilgrim attempts to find an island where he could feel the wonder that he had known as a child, hence the regress of the title.

Mere Christianity is the perfect place to begin for those hoping to get a better understanding of Christianity and what it offers to people.