On Salvation

It is right and inevitable that we shd. be much concerned about the salvation of those we love. But we must be careful not to expect or demand that their salvation shd. conform to some ready-made pattern of our own. Some Protestant sects have gone v. wrong about this. They have a whole programme of ‘conviction’, ‘conversion’ etc marked out, the same for everyone, & will not believe that anyone can be saved who doesn’t go through it ‘just so’. But (see the last chapter of Problem of P.) God has His own unique way with each soul.

There is no evidence that St. John even underwent the same kind of ‘conversion’ as St Paul. It’s not essential to believe in the devil: and I’m sure a man can get to Heaven without being accurate about Methuselah’s age. Also, as MacDonald says, ‘the time for saying comes seldom, the time for being is always there.’ What we practice, not (save at rare intervals) what we preach is usually our great contribution to the conversion of others.

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“Letter to Mrs Johnson, 3 Feb. 1955,” in The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, Vol. III, ed. Walter Hooper (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2004), 576.