# “Sacred things may become profane by becoming matters of the job” by C.S. Lewis

- Link: https://tollelege.net/2021/08/09/sacred-things-may-become-profane-by-becoming-matters-of-the-job-by-c-s-lewis/
- Published: 2021-08-09T12:00:34-05:00
- Author: tollelege

**“To Sheldon Vanauken **

_Magdalen College,_
 _Oxford_ _January 5, 1951_

Dear Mr. Van Auken,

We must ask three questions about the probable effect of changing your research 
subject to something more theological.

(1.) _Would it be better for your immediate enjoyment?_ Answer, probably but not
certainly, Yes.

(2.) _Would it be better for your academic career?_ Answer, probably No. You would
have to make up in haste a lot of knowledge which could not be very easily digested
in the time.

(3.) _Would it be better for your soul?_ I don’t know.

I think there is a great deal to be said for having one’s deepest spiritual interest
distinct from one’s ordinary duty as a student or professional man.

St Paul’s _job_ was tent-making. When the two coincide I should have thought there
was a danger lest the natural interest in one’s job and the pleasures of gratified
ambition might be mistaken for spiritual progress and spiritual consolation: and
I think clergymen sometimes fall into this trap.

Contrariwise, there is the danger that what is boring or repellent in the job may
alienate one from the spiritual life. And finally someone has said ‘_None are so
unholy as those whose hands are cauterized with holy _[_things_’](https://tollelege.net/2021/08/09/sacred-things-may-become-profane-by-becoming-matters-of-the-job-by-c-s-lewis#fn1):
sacred things may become profane by becoming matters of the job.

You _now_ want truth for her own sake: how will it be when the same truth is also
needed for an effective footnote in your thesis?

In fact, the change might do good or harm. I’ve always been glad myself that Theology
is not the thing I earn my living by.

On the whole, I’d advise you to get on with your tent-making. The performance of
a _duty_ will probably teach you quite as much about God as academic Theology would
do.

Mind, I’m not certain: but that is the view I incline to.

Yours,

C. S. Lewis”

–C.S. Lewis, [_The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis, Volume 3: Narnia, Cambridge, and Joy, 1950 – 1963_](https://amzn.to/2RjVgok),
Ed. Walter Hooper (New York: HarperCollins, 2007), 3: 82-83. Vanauken had asked 
Lewis his opinion as to whether he should continue with his postgraduate work in
history or study theology.

 1. Francis Bacon, _Essays_ (1625), ‘Of Atheism’: ‘The great atheists, indeed are hypocrites;
    which are ever handling holy things, but without feeling; so as they must needs
    be cauterized in the end.’

More quotes from [C.S. Lewis](https://tollelege.net/category/cs-lewis/) · More on
[Pride](https://tollelege.net/category/pride/)