SACRAMENTS FOR THE NEW AGE

The Mechanics of Salvation in the Works of Charles Williams

By John Mabry

The Twentieth Century burst upon the world with the bombs of the Great War. A people bereft by science of their Divinely appointed singularity wept for loss of their pretended innocence. A map of the mind exposed the aesthetic nerve to be nothing more than conditioned response, and God had been proven myth, leaving a desperate sea of frightened humanity rolling against each other in despair, devoid of identity, plan or purpose.

If God were to be approached at all, it would have to be on our own terms; that is, practical terms, relevant, rational terms. This, logically, applies not only to God, but to God's Church, God's People, God's Laws, God's Ordinances, and of course, God's Sacraments. And many philosophers and apologeticists have arisen from the urban wilderness crying not "Make straight the way of the Lord", but arguing instead "The way of the Lord is straight' . I don't think we need to list these prophets-we can all, I'm sure think of at least a few. Instead I will charge that there was a prophet in our midst and we heeded him not. The work of Charles Williams, of whom I speak, is not voluminous, but it is important. He has stated the simplicity of the Gospel clearly through his essays and practically through his novels. But most of all he has demonstrated the essence of mysticism almost tangibly. After a spell with Williams one finds that the physical world has somehow become less separated from the spiritual, and that suddenly, Williams' wild plots have become less fantastic; spiritual realities become more fathomable; one sees more clearly the results of cause and effect from one dimension to the other. Evil, in Williams' work.is totally self concerned, mostly with power for itself. But Evil is ultimately foolish, for it cannot abide nor comprehend Love, while Love, and weakness, and vulnerability, and surrender are utterly invincible. Love, in Williams' view, manifests itself in two profound concepts he calls "co-inherence" and "Exchange" (or "The Doctrine of Substituted Love").

Neither idea is new. Co-inherence, especially, goes back as far as recorded history can reveal. It is central to mysticism of every variety. The ancient Egyptian and Babylonian mystery religions, for example, practiced a mysticism intending to establish a union between man and the Divine. The Hindu mystic even today through an introverted (as opposed to an outward focused) mysticism seeks a similar absorption. Albert Schweitzer in his book The Mysticism of Paul the Apostle says of this type of mysticism:

It has sight of the Eternal in the Transient. Recognizing the unity of all things in God, in Being as such, it passes beyond the unquiet flux of becoming and disintegration into the peace of timeless being, and is conscious of itself as being in God, and in every moment eternal.(2)

This oneness with God therefore guaranteed wisdom, exaltation and immortality. Judaism is strange in that it has no mysticism. God and man are, from Adam's walking with God in the garden to the rending of the temple veil, totally separate, totally alien. Williams has said that "The sin of man is that he seeks to make himself God." (The Image of the City 145) Yet Christianity teaches that God has chosen to make Himself a man, and this is a completely different thing. What Christianity offers, then, is not a "God mysticism; [but] only a Christ-mysticism by means of which a man comes into relation to God" (Schweitzer 3).

When man accepts the grace that God freely offers through Christ, he enters into a mystical union with Christ, which is not simply an emotional experience (although it can involve emotion) like the mystery religions, but a factual reality. The believer co-inheres with Christ, exists in him, and Christ exists within the believer. But not only that, the believer by being "in Christ" also co-inheres to another believer who is "in Christ". In fact, all other believers who are "in Christ".

Our Lord promised to the members of His Church a particular and intense union with each other through Himself. He defined that union as being of the same nature as that which He had with His Father .... not merely that the Father and the Son existed co-equally, but that they existed co-inherently-that is, that the Son existed in the Father and that the Father existed in the Son... The same preposition was used to define our Lord's relations with His Church: 'we in him (sic) and he in us'... two are members of one another'.,(The Image of the City 149)

We are members of one another--not like members of a club, Williams points out (151), but membra: limbs.

But with or without Christ, co-inherence between two people is possible, and, Williams insists, happens constantly with husband-and-wife, and mother- and-fetus; wherever a soul contacts and experiences communion with another soul. This openness, this trust, is often the first wobbly step towards salvation.

The acceptance of co-inherence is absolutely necessary regarding a soul's salvation. Thomas Howard in his book The Novels of Charles Williams explains:

For Williams, hell is the place where such a denial leads eventually. To refuse co-inherence will reward me with solitude, impotence, wrath, illusion, and inanity. I will have reaped the harvest I have sown in my selfishness and egotism. I will have got what I wanted. I will be a damned soul.

On the other hand, the City of God is the place where we see co- inherence brought to a blissful fruitition.

Ah, here is another big Williams concept: "The City". It is, in fact, so big as to almost evade definition. The City is the Kingdom of God; it is the Church; it is become man and has walked among us; it is the Promise; it is "the Holy City, the New Jerusalem, descending out of Heaven from God" (Rev 21:2).

"The Holy Ghost moves us to be, by every means to which we are called, the Images of Christ, the types of that Original, in or out of the flesh. It is the intercourse of those free Images which is the union of the City. The name of the City is Union" (The Image of the City 103).

It is by the principle of co-inherence that the Doctrine of Substituted Love (or exchange) may be effected. The seed of the whole idea is explained in Williams' novel Descent Into Hell where Peter Stanhope offers to relieve Pauline of her crippling fear:

"...We all know what fear and trouble are. Very well-when you leave here you'll think of yourself that I've taken this particular trouble over instead of you. You'd do as much for me if I needed it, or for anyone. And I will give myself to it. I'll think of what comes to you, and imagine it, and know it, and be afraid of it. And then, you see, you won't .... let me put myself in your place, and be afraid instead of you .... And what can be easier than for me to carry a little while a burden that isn't mine? ...Haven't you heard it said that we ought to bear one an other's burdens?" (9-7-8).

And there it is. "Bear one anothers burdens." Out of love (real love, for he barely knows Pauline) Stanhope has offered to substitute himself for her and to bear her burden for her. All she need do is accept it. "As easy as picking up a package" Williams often says.

It's a neat idea, as a physical example, but how valid is that on a mystical, spiritual level? We may take the case of Moses, for one, who, out of love for the people of Israel, offers to substitute himself as the object of God's wrath on their sin. This foreshadows what is, of course, the ultimate case of substitution: Christ for Mankind. An exchange wrought of Love, of His righteousness for our sin. "Set your baggage down, ma'am, I'll take it from here." And all we need do is simply set it down!

Christ's substitution becomes not only the most significant symbol of Substituted Love, but it is also the act which enforces and validates all other acts of loving exchange. It is the archetype, then, of exchange and identifies a universal law. C.S. Lewis, commenting on Williams, stated:

The Atonement ... far from being a mere legal fiction... was simply the supreme instance of a universal law. 'He saved others, himself he cannot save; is a definition of the Kingdom. All salvation ... is vicarious. (Winship 121)

There are some important restrictions here. "In Christianity, the sacrifice is freely given; all involved benefit, but especially the giver.." (Bosky 19. Italics mine). The archetype bears this out: we are redeemed and Christ is glorified. In All Hallows Eve Lester substitutes herself for Betty, receiving in her stead the malignant spell cast by Simon Leclerc.

She had been standing and now she was no longer standing. She was leaning back on something, some frame which from her buttocks to her head supported her; indeed she could have believed, but she was not quite sure, that her arms, flung out on each side held on to a part of the frame, as along a beam of wood. I her fighting and sinking consciousness, she seemed to be almost lying along it, as she might be on a bed, only it was slanting. Between standing and lying, she held and was held. If it gave, as at any moment it might give, she would fall into the small steady chant, which heard in her ears and seen along her thighs, was undoing her. Then she would be undone. She pressed herself against that sole support. So those greater than she had come-saints, martyrs, confessors- but they joyously, knowing that this was the first movement of their re- edification in the City, and that thus in that earliest world fashioned of their earthly fantasies began the raising of the true houses and streets .... But what of integrity she possessed clung to that other integrity; her back pressed to it. It sustained her. (All Hallow's Eve 159-60)

As it does us.

Now, in the case of Christ's substitution for man-it cannot be complete until it has a man's consent-it must also be gladly received.

A man may either assent to it, give himself up, and find his fullfulness, liberty, and joy; or he may reject it, try to squirrel away some little granule of himself, and end up in solitude, bondage, and wrath. Assent or rejection. Joy or wrath. Heaven or hell. A man may choose,alas. If it seems dreadful and life-denying, we may recall the teaching of perhaps the greatest teacher ever to live, and find the same thing taught (Howard 17).

But as a man cannot receive Christ's pardon bull by consent, so no act of exchange can be valid unless what is freely given is also gladly received. "To emerge as a perfect act it again needs an act and a mutual act. The two persons concerned must co-inhere in that mutual act, and pardon must be doubly welcome" (The Image of the City 109).

The Doctrine of Substituted Love can find expression in every facet of day-to-day life, in almost any moment. Any little sacrifice of even the smallest part for someone else applies. As Lester's toleration of her suit,t- r fondling of her arm in the taxi was an act of exchange: patience for the sake of his feelings. (All Hallow's Eve) Lester remembers the time when Richard got out of bed to bring her a glass of water because she was thirsty. (163)..His comfort in exchange for her discomfort. And the motivator and the by-product is love. The eventual end of the pursuit of such exchange is a recognition of identification 'with Christ, and ultimately, salvation. "The mere attention of the mind to such a life of substitution will itself provide instances and opportunities. What is needed is precisely that attention" (The Image of the City 152).

One thing that is remarkable about Williams, though,is his insistence on our ability to bear one-another's non-visible burdens, such as pain, sickness, worry and, as in the case stated earlier with Stanhope and Pauline, even fear. And apparently such an exchange may be effected merely by the promise and consent to do so! "Compacts can be made for the taking over of the suffering of troubles, and worries, and distresses, as simply and as effectually as an assent is given to the carving of a parcel. A man can cease to worry about x because his friend has agreed to be worried by x" (151-2), Williams cites the case of St. Seraphim of Sarov who "...said or, a certain nun ?the ascetic discipline of death, that she should die instead of her sick brother Michael, whose work was not yet done"' (153, citing St. Seraphim of Sarove, A.F. Dobbie-Bateman). It is also popular C.S. Lewis-lore that Lewis bore the pain of his wife's cancer so that she could rest shortly before she died.

The Doctrine of Substituted Love demands our attention, for if what Williams says is true we must utilize this ability and practice actively the giving of ourselves to our spouses, families, friends, strangers,and perhaps especially, to our enemies. The Lord knows (to our great shame) that the commands "Love your neighbor" and "Bear each other's burdens" have for the most part been set aside as Sunday School cliche's instead of becoming second nature-let alone allowing them to become first.

The Doctrine of Substituted Love is the kernel of the whole Gospel. We eliminate our quarrel with the Epistle of St. James when we recognize this exchange as being what is meant by "works". This burden has been borne for you, now go and do likewise. Unfortunately, it is our (fallen) nature to forget even the best of intentions unless they are constantly thrust into our focus. How can we effect this? How can we insure this renewal of vision in a permanent and inspirational manner?

Which brings us to the subject of the sacraments:

The sacraments discussed will be limited to those common to all Christiandom: Baptism and the communion (which, to avoid confusion with the infinitive usage of "communion" will hence forward be referred to as the "Lord's Supper"). Regardless of the denominational format there is a mystery attached that cannot be avoided (and try as we Baptists might, we still haven't been able to extinguish the air of solemnity that accompanies our Lord's Supper celebration). One cannot attend a celebration of the Mass or the Eucharist and not be aware that there is something mystical going on here. Whether the elements actually become the literal Body and Blood is irrelevant. The fact is communion is sought, communion is administered and communion is achieved. "The Sacraments...are pledges, trumpeting to heaven, earth, and hell, that the Creation is good, and that it is being redeemed, and that the promise of this, all hell to the contrary notwithstanding, is to be found in these small, unprepossessing acts like Baptism and the Eucharist" (Howard 178 What is amazing about a study of the Sacraments is their endurance in spite of the evolution of Sacramental theory over the past two Millennia.

For Paul. as for John the Baptist:

... baptism secures something future (forgiveness of sins at the Judgment, and partaking of the outpouring of the Spirit). In its external "Christianization" in the Primitive-Christian Church it effected both something future (Forgiveness of sins at the Judgment) and something present (the possession of the Spirit) .... baptism is no longer an act in itself but the beginning of a process which will end with the coming of the Messianic glory. (Schweitzer, 263)

Paul's view of the Lord's Supper also had an eschatological perspective. For him, 11 partaking in the [Lord's Supper] of the Christian community is an anticipation of the table-fellowship with Christ at the Messianic feast."(Schweitzer 267). It is surprising to most modern Christians the radical difference between doctrinal statement and Paul's actual teaching. For Paul, everything was dependent upon the immediate return of Christ. When the Apostles began to die off, however, many people began to question Paul, and therefore, their faith. Adding to that stress was the threat of Gnosticism, which threatened to extinguish the church in it's very infancy.

To counter the dangerous teaching and the despair resulting from the Lord's delay, the author of the Johannine Gospel and the early Church father Ignatius found it necessary to adapt the focus of the Sacraments to a simpler context, which would be more readily accessible to the Hellenistic mind and immediately applicable in function.

For in the Eucharist is made manifest, for Ignatius, the act of conveyance and appropriation of redemption. In the bread and wine the becoming-one of matter and spirit is effected in the same way as in the corporeity of Jesus. They continue the existence of the Redeemer in a form capable of appropriation (Schweitzer 344)."

The Sacraments have, since then;experienced further evolution, gradually degenerating in mystical potential until they have become (for most Protestant splinter-denominations) no more than symbols of the last supper and the resurrection-revered symbols, granted-but still far from their origins. What is wonderful about the evolution of the Sacraments is that no one theory necissarily invalidates another. The Bread broken in Paul's anticipation, the Host laid on the parishoner's tongue, the cracker solemnly Drayed over and eaten-all have succeeded in effecting a communion with our God in Christ and as a Body.

Let's address these now in light of Williams' thought. The subject of Baptism, is dealt with briefly in an essay titled "The Redeemed City" in the collection Image of the City:

...the habit of the Church in the baptismal Rite has always testified. The new-born child emerges from its natural co-inherence in its mother into a supernatural co-inherence with the saints. It has received the communication of the evil of a fallen world; its blood is tainted from its soul-or from a world of souls with the [Enemy] and it will soon begin disastrously to pay back what it has disastrously received, in the exchanges (unless redeemed) of infernal conflict. At that moment it is caught by others and lifted into an exchange of grace-into others by others, into Another by Another (106).

For the adult, baptism will of course have as much a cognitive value as a mystic one. But again a tremendous co-inherence is achieved, he with Christ, he with the local believers he knows)and he with a world full of believers alive dead and yet-to-be that he does not yet know or may ever know of. He is at once with the City-he is in the City, the City is in him. He has identified himself with Christ and is now capable and (hopefully) desirous of a daily, incessant Identity-bearing the burdens of others. And lest we forget, I propose we view the Eucharist anew, with this in mind.

This is the Exchange, we receive the elements, Christ's offering in our stead, and gladly accepting his substitution , we experience joy in Exchange for our sickness and sin, and Christ is glorified. In this act we make the exchange again, and in so doing we agree to do the same. Go, and do likewise.

The implications of such a Sacramental focus is a mysticism of an extremely practical nature, necessitating neither (but certainly allowing for) emotional nor symbolic nor transubstantiational experiences. Whereas Paul's Sacraments looked toward the (humanly) unknowable future, the johannine/Ignatian Sacraments were strictly mystically oriented; and the prevalent protestant perspective is fixed firmly in a remembrance of things past, the Sacramental focus of co-inherence and Exchange are pragmatic and rooted firmly in the here and now. A priceless call to Christian activism.

Williams' ideas also allow the possibility for eliminating sore spots that many feel towards their faith concerning what Dante termed "virtuous pagans". In Williams' fiction we find again and again the Doctrine of Substituted Love moving someone towards salvation. In All Hallow's Eve as we saw before, Lester, ignorant of Christianity in any practical sense, was sustained by the Cross, by Christ's Great Exchange,because in her selfless act of love for Betty, she had identified herself (however unknowingly) with Christ. What does that do to the implications of Christ's "No man comes to the Father but by Me?" statement? Does mere identity effect co-inherence? Should we just dismiss these elements as necessary to Williams' fiction, or might we consider them at face value? This is material for another study, however, but the questions must be answered, and hopefully from prayerful deliberation, not the automatic, dogmatic, pat judgments we seem to be so fond of throwing in the face of something that might possibly challenge our faith, might possibly sharpen our focus, might possibly resurrect our routine-entrenched daily lives.

The Sacraments must be vital, or they cease to be relevant. If they cease to be relevant we lose a priceless celebration of mystic Communion. Williams has been ignored by the Christian world at large too long. His essays are out of print, his novels are considered merely fiction (or worse, not considered at all). And very slowly, even those are disappearing. We may be holding the answer to the New Age at arms length.

Shall we embrace?

Works Cited

Boskv, Bernadette Urace and Goetia, Magic as Forced Compensation in All

Hallows' Eve" Mythlore, Spring 1986.pp. 19-23.

Howard, Thomas T. The Novels of Charles Williams, Oxford UP 1983.

New International Version, The New Testament, International Bible Society.

Zondervan, 19-78.

Schweitzer, Albert The Mvsticism of Paul the Apostle, Trans. William Mont

gomery, B.D. 2nd Ed. A. and C. Black Limited, 1953

Williams, Charles. The Image of the Citv. Oxford UP, 1958.

Descent Into Hell Pelligrini & Cudahy, 1948.

Reprinted December 19~5, Eerdmans Printing Company.

All Hallows' Eve, Pelligrini & Cudahv, 1948.

Reprinted September 1985 Eerdmans Printing Company.

Winship, George P., Jr. Shadows of Imagination. Ed. Mark R. Hellegas.

Carbondale. Southern Illinois University Press, 1969.

Citing C.S. Lewis, Aurthurian Torso, London, 1948, p. 123.

Cited by Bosky, as above. p. 20.