Quotes from Leland Ryken

It is true that the Puritans banned all recreation on Sundays and all games of chance, gambling, bear baiting, horse racing, and bowling in or around taverns at all times. They did so, not because they were opposed to fun, but because they judged these activities to be inherently harmful or immoral.

A Christian philosophy of literature begins with the same agenda of issues that any philosophy of literature addresses. Its distinctive feature is that it relates these issues to the Christian faith.

The Puritans were obsessed with the dangers of wealth.

Literature incarnates its meanings as concretely as possible. The knowledge that literature gives of a subject is the kind of knowledge that is obtained by (vicariously) living through an experience.

In Puritan thinking, the Christian life was a heroic venture, requiring a full quota of energy.

The Puritans' sense of priorities in life was one of their greatest strengths. Putting God first and valuing everything else in relation to God was a recurrent Puritan theme.

literature enlarges our world of experience to include both more of the physical world and things not yet imagined, giving the "actual world" a "new dimension of depth" (Lewis, Of Other Worlds 29). This makes it possible for literature to strip Christian doctrines of their "stained glass" associations and make them appear in their "real potency" (37), a possibility Lewis himself realized in the Narnia series and the space trilogy.

As Francis Schaeffer reminded us, "The Christian is the one whose imagination should fly beyond the stars

Passion is a far better prioritizer than any organization system. Soul refreshment comes from SEEING glory — not getting stuff done.

The only knowledge that is worthwhile, writes Northrop Frye. is the knowledge that leafs to wisdom, for knowledge without wisdom is a body without life.

Ease and luxury, such as our affluence brings us today, do not make for maturity; hardship and struggle do

If you want to make a Christian work, then be Christian, and simply try to make a beautiful work, into which your heart will pass; do not try to "make Christian.