A False Vision of God

The following is excerpted from the June 2014 email exchange between Will and Art.

Art:

Saint Augustine in his Study by Botticelli

I like that last part about the "blade of grass." 

That's C.S. Lewis artistically rendering the Augustinian doctrine of evil not having being in the usual sense. Elsewhere, Lewis describes the damned soul as being "nearly nothing." Heaven is literally experiencing the Source of Being in the fullest possible way. So it would be a superabundant, unexcelled experience of being. Hell, since it is the experience of being cut off from the Source of Being, must be as close to nonexistence as is possible for created beings with immortal souls.

The fact that Lena made Will pledge to make Arthur famous on her deathbed makes it a no-brainer that she's going to Purgatory at best. 

Saints don't say those sorts of things!

Will:

True. 

I think what makes Lena seem saintly to a modern audience is that she's always doing good things. But, then again, she's an old-world Catholic. She might have more fear of God than an all-consuming love of Him. 

She might think that she's protecting the family from its wealth through her acts of charity. That fear would be consistent with a false vision of God as a scale measurer, a pretty common misconception. Still, I think she genuinely loves the poor and sees Christ in them, although not perfectly or mystically. Perhaps she does it because of her own childhood poverty. So this loving the person of Christ in the poor keeps her from going to Hell, while her bargaining and manipulating is what needs to be burnt off on Purgatory. 

Although the family doesn't really need Arthur to become a star for financial reasons, maybe she also wants to protect Arthur from the bullies or wants him to show the world. 

Or maybe she has been partially converted to the gospel of the American Dream as preached by Stan.