The dwarfs are for the dwarfs
If you have wondered, as I have, how in the world some of our neighbors are so determined to spread (and believe) malicious rumors and conspiracy fantasies in the wake of natural disasters, a Sunday sermon.
C.S. Lewis wrote his The Chronicles of Narnia series in the early 1950’s, publishing “The Last Battle” in 1956. The books concern English children teleported to Narnia, a magical land filled with talking animals as well as humans, the good and the bad. Like Lewis’s space trilogy, the Narnia books are rich in Christian allegory (much of it barely allegory). They contain some scenes never to be forgotten.
For those who never read “The Last Battle,” one scene may be instructive this morning, whatever Lewis meant by it. Perhaps disillusionment and loss of faith after the war. In our case 70 years later, perhaps the dispelling of the comforting notion among MAGA cult members that this country was founded by and for people who look and believe like them. My friends, my neighbors, my church, my money, etc.
The last of the true Narnians find themselves trapped in cave used as a stable. As an enemy army waits outside, inside they wait to die. The great lion Aslan, Narnia’s Christ figure, appears and opens the back of the cave to a land of goodness and light, basically heaven’s footfills. His faithful rise to join him there.
Except the dwarfs. Narnia has changed for them. They feel betrayed by a false Aslan sold them by enemies. They’ve darkened, turned inward and cynical, tribal, and in the end self-deluded. They’ve rejected hope. The exit to a better world is there but they cannot see it:
“Aslan,” said Lucy through her tears, “could you – will you – do something for these poor Dwarfs?”
“Dearest,” said Aslan, “I will show you both what I can, and what I cannot, do.” He came close to the Dwarfs and gave a low growl: low, but it set all the air shaking. But the Dwarfs said to one another, “Hear that? That’s the gang at the other end of the stable. Trying to frighten us. They do it with a machine of some kind. Don’t take any notice. They won’t take us in again!”
Aslan raised his head and shook his mane. Instantly a glorious feast appeared on the Dwarfs’ knees: pies and tongues and pigeons and trifles and ices, and each Dwarf had a goblet of good wine in his right hand. But it wasn’t much use. They began eating and drinking greedily enough, but it was clear that they couldn’t taste it properly. They thought they were eating and drinking only the sort of things you might find in a stable. One said he was trying to eat hay and another said he had got a bit of an old turnip and a third said he’d found a raw cabbage leaf. And they raised golden goblets of rich red wine to their lips and said “Ugh! Fancy drinking dirty water out of a trough that a donkey’s been at! Never thought we’d come to this.” But very soon every Dwarf began suspecting that every other Dwarf had found something nicer than he had, and they started grabbing and snatching, and went on to quarreling, till in a few minutes there was a free fight and all the good food was smeared on their faces and clothes or trodden under foot. But when at last they sat down to nurse their black eyes and their bleeding noses, they all said:
“Well, at any rate there’s no Humbug here. We haven’t let anyone take us in. The Dwarfs are for the Dwarfs.”
“You see,” said Aslan. “They will not let us help them. They have chosen cunning instead of belief. Their prison is only in their own minds, yet they are in that prison; and so afraid of being taken in that they cannot be taken out.”
1956.
The Good Liars, of course, choose only their craziest MAGA encounters for posting. But they are plentiful enough.
MAGAs distrust the government. (It sent hurricanes to red states.)
MAGAs won’t trust science. (The Earth is flat.)
MAGAs believe FEMA is not here and to blame for what it is doing here and what they imagine it’s doing here but it’s not. (Despite the Chinooks and Black Hawks flying over my house.)
The dwarfs are for the dwarfs, trapped in a prison of their own minds.
And that’s my sermon.
[Missed my 6 a.m. PT post. Still having internet outages and bandwidth issues here in Asheville, both fiber (ATT) and cell (Verizon). The fixers are fixing their fixes. The outage ATT promised to have fixed at midnight, they changed last night to 3 a.m. Now they’ve changed that projection to 6 p.m. today. Bandwidth comes and goes. Had to go around my ass to get to my elbow, figuratively speaking, to post this. ]