Skewtruth Letters: Magnifying Small Restrictions

Preface to the Skewtruth Letters

This post is slightly different from a typical post. It is actually an extra credit assignment for one of my classes, Christian Masterworks. This post is an imitation of S.C. Lewis's book Screwtape Letters. Screwtape Letters is a series of letters written by a master demon to his nephew, a less experienced demon, teaching him how better to tempt the person he has been assigned to, his "patient." C. S. Lewis is not claiming these letters to truly be factual in the sense that this is really how people are tempted, but he wrote Screwtape Letters to view the subject of spiritual living differently. To see how it could perhaps appear from the opposite perspective.

Writing this letter was indeed very interesting. It did feel very strange writing advice on how "better" to get someone to sin, as opposed to avoiding sin. =P As mentioned, this one was written for an assignment for class, but I do hope to write a couple more in the future just for fun. It was very beneficial for me to write, and I hope that it can be of benefit for you as the reader as well. 

My dear Weazelwolf,

I understand that your patient has now been enrolled in a Christian university, and will be starting at the end of the summer. This is unfortunate I must say. If you had done a better job getting him to reject his parents' wishes and long to be with his basketball friends from Florida State then we would be on much better ground. But now, since you were too incompetent to manage that simple task, we are in the worst dilemma we have yet faced. This Christian university he is going to is one of the most conservative and best universities in the country (from the Enemy's perspective that is, of course). However, all hope is not lost. There are still opportunities at this university which we can use to bring your patient back. Assuming you don't mess it up again.

One of the things which we can use for our advantage is that this university is one of the larger Christian universities, and therefore must have many rules to keep things in order. Rules involving dress, personal appearance, punctuality, and many others. By themselves these rules aren't that useful, they are merely put in place to reduce "mishaps," and to keep the university unified, and to maintain a professional atmosphere and appearance. But these rules should be a great benefit to us with your patient. As I understand it, your patient greatly enjoys his own personal comfort. He enjoys wearing his jeans and T-shirts, and strongly dislikes dressing up for any kind of event, including church. The fact that he dresses more casually than most to attend church and formal events typically isn't much of a help to us since he is not doing so out of rebellion. So normally it isn't an issue. But when he gets to the university you should be able to exploit this factor in a spectacular way. Because of the nature of the university, they require their students to look nice and dress professionally, both for classes and especially for any formal events that they have on campus (and they have many of them). Your job will be to convince your patient that the reason the school requires him to dress up is because they think that "Christians are more 'spiritual' if they wear a tie." It is actually quite humorous how easy it is to convince some of these people that that is the case. Even though the university only has those rules in place to keep things organized and to have a professional appearance, it is very easy to get the students to falsely judge the university's motives and claim that they are wrong in establishing their rules. (When in all actually, if those same students become businessmen or women in a non-Christian environment, they will most likely be held to an even stricter dress code).

This example of the issue with the dress code is just an example though. What I want you to do is to take any small rule and magnify it in his mind, to the point where he sees it as a major spiritual issue. Help him see things as restrictions and not just rules. When he is told that he must keep his room clean, make him think that the university considers that anyone who has a messy room obviously must not be a "spiritual" person.

It is critical that you fulfill these instructions carefully. If you do, then we will be well on our way to building a hostile attitude in your patient toward the university and any Christian authority over him. He will grow to believe that everyone who has rules set up which keep him from participating in any activity which he wants to participate in or requiring him to do something which he doesn't want to do, has those rules set up because they think that the only way to be a proper Christian is to do it their way. Once you have him thinking this way, we are only a short step away from getting him to believe that he is his own source of authority for right and wrong. He will come to believe that if he sees something as acceptable or right then it must be right, no matter what anyone else thinks.

The Enemy has often stated that Christians should be willing to give up various pleasures or niceties for the sake of avoiding controversy with others or causing another person to "stumble," as they put it. It is imperative that you blind him to this sickening ideal which the Enemy has concocted. When your patient is thinking about any rule, regulation, or restriction which is set before him, you must only let him think about how that rule is affecting him and him alone. You must block out all others from his mind, and have him focus on how that rule restricts his freedom, his liberty, his rights, how it is a nuisance to him, an inconvenient for him. If you allow him to get his focus off of himself then all our efforts will have been for nothing.

I trust that you will be able to accomplish this task without fouling up like some of the assignments you have in the past. I am looking forward to your report next week. Make sure to include any useful information from Goudsin on how she is getting your patient's mother to annoy him by her constant nagging.

Your affectionate Uncle,                   

Skewtruth