Recovering the Vision

“Every human society possesses a moral and spiritual imaginative vision, a set of assumptions and ways of looking at things according to which life proceeds.”  

– Monsignor James P. Shea, From Christendom to Apostolic Mission

Since the beginning of civilization, every culture has had a way of viewing the world and interpreting it. In cultures like Greece and Rome a pantheon of gods were thought to exist that control the primal forces of nature and humanity. Other cultures such as those found in Africa and America viewed each part of creation as being spiritually connected. These different ways of viewing the world instructed each culture on how they were to live and act. Lately I have been reading a lot of J.R.R. Tolkien for a class I am taking and outside of his work involving Middle Earth, Tolkien had spent a considerable amount of time discussing the role myth and fantasy. One particular work is that of the Mythopoeia, where Tolkien puts to poetry a dialogue he had with C.S. Lewis on the role of myths. As Tolkien would say, myths are humanity’s attempt to explain that which appears unexplainable. It is not that myths are made up and not real. Rather myths are stories that help us to have a vision of the world.

For western civilization the central myth that has formed our vision has been the story of Christianity. The life of Christ and the story of the Church has been the story that has informed our society how to live. Writers like Tolkien and Louis referred to the Christian story as the Christian mythos. They had come to see that this story was a true myth that gave the best vision of the world and the best way to live. Yet as we look around people reject it as false and reject the way of life it proposes. Many people have de-constructed their faith and there are even attempts to mock the Christian story on grand stages. So, what happens though when a society rejects a story or myth? When a culture rejects the stories and myths that formed it, that culture loses its vision. Perhaps there are times when certain stories and myths must be rejected, so a new story can take its place. However the story of Christianity can not simply be replace. Fundamentally this is the truest of all stories and myths. If we reject this story nothing can take its place and we will lose out on a vision which has been fundamental to the world.

So how do we recover this lost vision? In his essay On Fairy Stories, Tolkien discusses that one of the central components of fantasy or a fairy tale is recovery. A good story of fiction is meant to help us recover a vision of how the world should be. When a culture rejects that which has formed it and that which is ultimately true, perhaps there is a need for fantasy and escapism. Reading works of fiction which are based on the true, the good and the beautiful can reorient us to where we have been. Stories which spark awe and wonder in our hearts leave us wondering about how we can live lives of greatness. In a world which is seeming to lose its vision of the truth perhaps what we need now more than every is a bit of fantasy and myth to show us how to live again.