"Men Without Chests" Are Also Men Without Novels

What C.S. Lewis and Charlotte Mason teach us about the necessity of reading living books for our well-being.

When my son was three years old, I set out to teach him to memorize the Westminster Shorter Catechism. Within a few days, he could recite to me, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.” I prided myself on this, and began to believe that this simple work each morning would change his heart and mind, and train him to obey  me and to love God.

Yet despite memorizing questions one, two, and three, my son didn’t miraculously learn obedience or love for God. Each day, he continued to knock his brothers over, ignore the boundaries we set, and escape from his room in the night to feed his twin brothers ice cream. 

One day as I sat down with him to discuss his bad behaviour, I reminded him of the first question he had learned from the catechism. “Don’t you remember? Man’s chief end is to glorify God. You are not glorifying God.”

He tilted his head at me. “What does glorify mean?”

I didn’t realize it, but my desire for hearing the correct answers inadvertently left me forming a young man without a chest—and as I looked at myself, perhaps I had done the same to my own soul.