“Nearly all I loved I believed to be imaginary; nearly all that I believed to be real I thought grim and meaningless.”
Becoming C.S. Lewis p. 183
The atheist Lewis looked beyond the here and now to find enjoyment because the atheist Lewis knew the material was ultimately purposeless. There is an integrity for the materialist to recognize the grimness of reality. But is it surprising that the materialist would hope for something else? The reality—which Lewis hit upon eventually—is that there is something else out there, and all his fiction and fantasy reading pointed to that other. And that steady drumbeat from different centuries and genres and worldview was too incessant to ignore.
But even before he recognized it, he knew he loved it. And we can’t so quickly set aside what we love—even if what we love is an antithesis to who we are. Ask Romeo or Juliet. Or as Mr. Walker from M. Night Shyamalan’s The Village would say, “The world moves for love.”
And not just the world—a world view as well.
Lingering Over Leaves 