What have we lost?
(Pictured: C.S. Lewis and Paddy Moore in WWI)
I was watching a documentary about the life of C.S. Lewis recently and was really struck by an event in his life. In 1917, at 19 years of age, Lewis was sent to the Somme Valley in France to fight in the trenches of World War One. Lewis and a close friend, Paddy Moore, made a pact with each other: If one of them died, the other would take care of his family. Paddy Moore was killed in the fighting and C.S. Lewis provided for Paddy's mother and sister for the rest of their lives. Lewis himself was injured in the war.
What if it had been the other way around? What if C.S. Lewis had been the one who died in the war? The world would have never known of Narnia, Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce and the rest of Lewis' prodigious literary output.
16 million people died in WWI (9.7 million military personnel and 6.8 million civilians). How many C.S. Lewis's were among them? What treasures of the human mind and spirit will the world never know as a result of that war?
It is estimated that 160 million people have been killed in wars in the 20th century. How many Mozarts, Beethovens, Einsteins, Salks, Mother Teresas and C.S. Lewis's have we lost?
I was watching a documentary about the life of C.S. Lewis recently and was really struck by an event in his life. In 1917, at 19 years of age, Lewis was sent to the Somme Valley in France to fight in the trenches of World War One. Lewis and a close friend, Paddy Moore, made a pact with each other: If one of them died, the other would take care of his family. Paddy Moore was killed in the fighting and C.S. Lewis provided for Paddy's mother and sister for the rest of their lives. Lewis himself was injured in the war.
What if it had been the other way around? What if C.S. Lewis had been the one who died in the war? The world would have never known of Narnia, Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce and the rest of Lewis' prodigious literary output.
16 million people died in WWI (9.7 million military personnel and 6.8 million civilians). How many C.S. Lewis's were among them? What treasures of the human mind and spirit will the world never know as a result of that war?
It is estimated that 160 million people have been killed in wars in the 20th century. How many Mozarts, Beethovens, Einsteins, Salks, Mother Teresas and C.S. Lewis's have we lost?
1 Comments:
Add to the numbers killed all those who return from war unable to function in a meaningful way in society, and the toll of war is much greater.
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