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PARTISAN REVIEW
the contemporary imagination, along with the critical intelligence and
the religious sense, to bring our own conceptions, however slowly and
painfully, up to that level and beyond it.
W. H. AUDEN
A.
Cause
Assuming that the editors are convinced of the truth and
adequacy of some form of naturalism as the true religious Faith
(of which more in a moment), then, of course, they must look for
extra-religious reasons why any person should become, say, a Chris–
tian. From the point of view of the latter, however, the situation looks
quite different; what to him calls for explanation are the reasons
which previously prevented him from seeing the truth and allowed
him to be satisfied with, say, a naturalism which he now sees to be
false.
Thus, though both sides will readily agree that the breakdown
in the West of the radical political movement and the rather es–
chatological situation of our civilization are "causes" in the con–
version of some people to Christianity, we shall differ very much as
to the meaning and significance of the word in this context.
Christianity, of all religions, attaches a unique importance to
history; e.g. the clause in the creed "He suffered under Pontius
Pilate" expresses the belief that, for God, a particular moment in
history when the Jews had reached a certain point in their develop–
ment, religious, intellectual, political, and the gentiles in theirs, was
"the fullness of the time," the right moment for the eternal vow to
be made Flesh and the Divine Sacrifice to take place.
If
such a God
does exist, then all the historical realities of that time, the Roman
Empire, the Mystery Cults, etc., must have been known to Him as
characteristics of the fullness of time.
Again, in
The Confessions,
St. Augustine gives a detailed ac–
count of his personal historical situation, his parents,
his
friends, his
intellectual development, his character; but to him they are relevant,
not as causes of his conversion, but as evidences that the God of
love must permit his creations free will which can refuse the grace
at the same time that they are seeking it.
