A Severe Mercy

"I wanted the fine keen bow of a schooner cutting the waves with Davy and me -- just Davy and me. I didn't want God. He was too heavy. I wanted Him approving from a considerable distance. I wanted to be free -- like a Gypsy. I wanted life itself, the colour of fire and loveliness of life. And Christ now and then, like a loved poem I could read when I wanted to. I didn't want us to be swallowed up in God. I wanted holidays from the school of Christ." I read this passage from "A Severe Mercy" over a decade ago. And, each time I read it, it still hits me in the gut....because I see myself so clearly in the words. Upon being published, one reviewer wrote that the book touched him so deeply that, finally, it was like an essay in self-understanding. I echo that sentiment. This book does, indeed, make most books on courtship and marriage seem shoddy....but it also illuminates how great is the mortal capacity for selfishness...and selflessness...and pervasive bliss beyond understanding. This book shall make you cry, and laugh, and revel in the simplicity and profound wisdom of the 18 letters from C.S. Lewis to Vanauken. But, most importantly, it shall make you question your spiritual depth, your tenacity of life, and your definition of love.

After several readings of this book over the past few years, I can conclude without any hesitation that it is the most moving and unforgettable memoir I've ever read. It is relevant to note that all 29 of the other ... reviewers (at the time of my own writing) rate it a solid 5 stars... it really deserves a sixth. Not only for it's amazing true content, but for the beautiful way in which the author lays it all out. This book will literally captivate your imagination, sweep you away, and tug you towards a deeper understanding of the depths of "inloveness" (a Vanauken term) possible in God-ordained marriage.Sheldon and Jean Vanauken were living the dream of togetherness that most people only.... well, DREAM about... until they came face to face with the fact that perhaps "perpetual springtime is not allowed." Those words were from their personal friend, the Oxford don C.S. Lewis and addressed to Sheldon as he tried to make sense of his overwhelming grief.This is the story of a profound love between two people... a love that has its genesis, consummation, and terminus in heavenly places. If your eyes are dry all the way through this book... well, never mind... they won't be.

What a beautifully engrossing book. I had known about the kind of book A Severe Mercy was for some years, and had (unconsciously) been avoiding it, for I knew it was a book about, and for, grieving. It is also a story about a sweet, adventurous, wide-awake marriage.But most of all, it is a message to the reader about the most pure and complete love of all, the love of God for his creation. One should read this book only if one is prepared (Christian or not) to be confronted with the awesome (and undeniable) truth of God's existense and his relentlessly loving pursuit of his children.

After putting it off for several years, I finally read A Severe Mercy, between Maunday Thursday and Easter Sunday, 1999. With Christ's Passion, Death, and Resurrection as the background, along with my wife's yearning to leave our Lutheran exile and join the Roman Catholic Church, I cried my way through the book, simply unable to restrain tears of hurt, joy, compassion, sorrow, and very strong empathy. These tears were also shed in the context of Little Lost Marion, Vanauken's story of finding the child Davy had at age 14, and which she put up for adoption, not aborting. Sheldon and Davy never had children, a pre Christian decision a Christian Vanauken came to regret. Then it hit me. The power of the book doesn't lie primarily in the story of grief and lost love, as poignant and beautiful as it is. Rather, if we stop with Sheldon and Davy's love for each other, we will miss Vanauken's major point: Davy's death as God's "severe mercy" to keep Sheldon in God's love. Davy's death allowed God to destroy the 'shining barrier" of their love, kill that idol, and reclaim Vanauken for himself. Mercy, indeed, if you can handle it, and Vanauken, in God's grace did. Perfect Lenten and Holy Week reading! But also a perfect book to help Christians understand the lengths to which God will go to keep his children and to see that in the great hurts and disappointments of life, God's severe mercy is frequently at work.