The Three Tests
One of the debts Touchstone owes C. S. Lewis is that in editorial policy it has always followed his example in Mere Christianity to stay out of disputes between and within Christian “denominations,” so as not to favor one church or faction over another. Our readers have never found us telling them to be Catholic, Protestant, or Orthodox, nor have we published articles that purport to settle disputes between Franciscans and Dominicans, the Ecumenical Patriarch and his Muscovite counterpart, supra- and infra-lapsarian Calvinists, Lutherans, and Reformed, or those who baptize infants and those who do not. None of that is part of “mere Christian” concern, despite the loyalty of the various editors to one church or another.
Tests One & Two
This policy is far from unproblematic for some devout Christians, for whom membership in their own communion is an absolute requirement for saving communion with Christ. This writer was raised in such a church (it happened to be Protestant), and wherever this is the case, there is no interest in the gentilism of a mere “Christianity” that may be faulty but is potentially corrigible, as all true faith must be. Consequently, there is no sympathy among people with these convictions for a journal like Touchstone, which advertises the possibility, and articles submitted to us that assume the habiliments of partisan apologetics or that only address their own fellowship must find a home elsewhere.
In brief, those who write for a journal of mere Chris-tianity must believe that it in some sense exists and is a rewarder of those who diligently seek it. This is the first test the writing must pass, and the second is like unto it.
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S. M. Hutchens is a senior editor and longtime writer for Touchstone.
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