Luther and Lewis

Tribulation we esteem a precious thing and glory in it, for we know that sorrow helps to teach us patience, and patience brings us experience, and experience teaches us to hop, and hope does not put us to shame.—Martin Luther, Christmas Eve Sermon 1522

One of the things that distinguishes man from the other animals is that he wants to know things, wants to find out what reality is like, simply for the sake of knowing. When that desire is completely quenched in anything, I think he has become something less than human.... Christianity claims to give an account of facts—to tell you what the real universe is like. Its account of the universe may be true, or it may not, once and the question is really before you, then your natural inquisitiveness must have you want to know the answer. If Christianity is untrue, then no honest man will want to believe it, however helpful it may be; if it is true, every honest man will want to believe it, even if it gives no help at all.—C. S. Lewis, Business of Heaven, p. 293.