God’s Presence

A question at once arises. Is it still God speaking when a liar or a blasphemer speaks? In one sense, almost Yes. Apart from God he could not speak at all; there are no words not derived from the Word; no acts not derived from Him who is Actus purus. And indeed the only way in which I can make real to myself what theology teaches about the heinousness of sin is to remember that every sin is the distortion of an energy breathed into us–an energy which, if not thus distorted, would have blossomed into one of those holy acts whereof “God did it” and “I did it” are both true descriptions. We poison the wine as He decants it into us; murder a melody He would play with us as the instrument. We caricature the self-portrait He would pain. Hence all sin, whatever else it is, is sacrilege.

We must no doubt, distinguish this ontological continuity between Creator and creature which is, so to speak, “given” by the relation between them, from the union of wills which, under grace, is reached by a life of sanctity. The ontological continuity is, I take it, unchangeable, and exists between God and a reprobate (or a devil) no less than between God and a saint. “Whither shall I go then from thy presence? If I go down to hell, thou are there also.”

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C.S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer (San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1964), 69.