Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76 Page 77 Page 78 Page 79 Page 80 Page 81 Page 82 Page 83 Page 8458 Plough Quarterly • Spring 2016 I nsigh t Caring for a Neighbor’s Soul In January 1942, as German bombers were terrorizing British cities, C. S. Lewis took the gospel to the airwaves, appearing repeatedly on the BBC’s religious programs (the talks were later collected in the book Mere Christianity). Increasing fame, however, did not diminish Lewis’s willingess to answer the many letters he received, many as a result of his radio talks. Here he counsels a former student who is experiencing a “trough” – a time of personal difficulties. Taken from The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, volume 2, ed. Walter Hooper (Harper San Francisco, 2005), 506–507. Copyright © 2004 by C.S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. Extract reprinted by permission. Paula Modersohn-Becker, Still Life with Jug Dear Mrs. Neylan, Sorry you’re in a trough. I’m just emerging (at least I hope I am) from a long one myself. As for the difficulty of believing it is a trough, one wants to be careful about the word “believing.” We often mean by it “having confidence or assurance as a psychological state” – as we have about the existence of furniture. But that comes and goes and by no means always accompanies intellec- tual assent. For example, in learning to swim you believe, and even know intellectually, that water will support you, long before you feel any real confidence in the fact. . . . In the meantime, as one has learnt to swim only by acting on the assent in the teeth of all instinctive conviction, so we shall proceed to faith only by acting as if we had it. Adapting a passage in The Imitation of Christ [Thomas à Kempis], one can say: “What would I do now if I had a full assurance that there was only a temporary trough,” and having got the answer, go and do it. I am a man, and therefore lazy: you a woman, therefore probably a fidget. So it may be good to advise you (though it would be bad to me) not even to try to do in the trough all you can do on the peak. . . . I know all about the despair of overcoming chronic temptations. It is not serious, provided self-offended petulance, annoyance at breaking records, impatience, etc. doesn’t get the upper hand. No amount of falls will really undo us if we keep on picking ourselves up each time. We shall of course be very muddy and tattered children by the time we reach home. But the bathrooms are all ready, the towels put out, and the clean linen clothes are in the airing cupboard. The only fatal thing is to lose one’s temper and give up. It is when we notice the dirt that God is most present to us: it is the very sign of his presence.  Image from Wikimedia Commons (public domain) C. S. LEWIS