Today we finally begin Season 3! After covering some podcast housekeeping, we are introduced to Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis expert, Andrew Lazo.
S3E1: “Welcome to Season 3!” (Download)
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Timestamps
01:48 – Drink-of-the-week
02:42 – Quote-of-the-week
21:40 – Interview with Andrew Lazo
47:04 – Closing remarks
YouTube Version
The audio for this episode is available on YouTube:
After Show Skype Session
This Season, after each episode, Matt and I will be recording a ten-minute Skype conversation:
Show Notes
• I introduced my co-host as Matt “Too Cool For School” Bush. Since Matt was resistant to my haikus, I need a creative outlet so I’ve decided to introduce him with a different nickname each episode. Also Matt’s Mum wanted me to be more affirming of her son!
• Matt suggested that we aren’t amateurs any more, since we’ve now been to a C.S. Lewis conference. I said that we actually might need to downgrade ourselves even further!
• The drink-of-the-week for Matt was his favourite, Macallan 12. I had just been on a long run with my girlfriend, so I was drinking a pint of water, paired with a glass of Vat 69.
• The quote-of-the-week was chosen from Season 1’s book:
“The Son of God became a man to enable men to become sons of God”
Mere Christianity
• Matt then began bringing everyone up-to-date with our news…
• We have a new logo:
• The website has had some work done on it, including a new blog section.
• We’re going to add some short video conversations to our YouTube channel.
• In Season 3, each week we’re going to be sending out an email to anyone subscribed to our Newsletter. The email will contain a link to that week’s podcast episode, as well as a blog post and a YouTube discussion. You can subscribe on the website.
• We also have apparel for sale. You can buy t-shirts from Plena Gratia Designs. Matt wants to have Patagonia vests with our logo at some point. We have pint glasses and whisky glasses laser-etched with our logo, but they’re not yet publicly available.
• Matt and I have also been setting up Slack channel. When we launch it, it’ll allow listeners to chat with us and with each other.
• Matt asked everyone to rate, review and share the podcast. I suggested that listeners text some friends and read the book together.
• Matt confuses “slang” with “innuendo”. Fortunately, he remembers the difference between “apostolate”, “apostate” and “prostate”. When Matt was congratulating himself for not being kicked off as my co-host now for two Seasons, I quoted The Princess Bride:
“Good night, Westley. Good work. Sleep well. I’ll most likely kill you in the morning“
Dread Pirate Roberts
• For this Season, each episode is usually going to cover at least two episodes. We’re doing this to keep a reasonable pace through the book. I reiterated that I haven’t read this book before and will be reading along, episode-by-episode. Previously we compared ourselves to “Pinky and The Brain” and Matt is rather excited to take up the mantle of “The Brain”…
• We reminisced a little, thinking back to the early days of the podcast…
• We’re going to be having Andrew Lazo on the show at least three times this Season to talk about Till We Have Faces since it’s his speciality. We therefore cut to the interview I conducted with him…
• I introduced Andrew Lazo:
Andrew Lazo is a internationally-known speaker and writer specializing on C.S. Lewis and the Inklings. He earned his Masters in Modern British Literature from Rice University. He is a frequent speaker around the U.S. and U.K. and has written several articles on C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.
Andrew Lazo biographical introduction
In 2009, Andrew published Mere Christians, a book where 50 different Christians shared their stories of how they met the mind and imagination of Lewis and how this shaped the course of their spiritual journeys. After spending seven and a half years teaching both English and C.S. Lewis at Houston Christian High School, he is now studying at Virginia Theological Seminary and preparing for ordination in the Episcopal Church. Andrew is married to author, speaker, and radio host Christin Ditchfield Lazo.
For more than a decade, Andrew has been working on a long-awaited study of Till We Have Faces… and I’m rather hoping that having Andrew on the show multiple times this Season will “keep us going” until he finally finishes and publishes it.
• I asked Andrew to tell us how he first discovered Lewis and how it shaped your life.
• I asked Andrew about his initial reaction to the book. Andrew introduced me to the word “bumfuzzled”!
• We discussed the “pairing” of Lewis books, such as The Four Loves and Till We Have Faces.
• Andrew told us about the background to the writing of Till We Have Faces. We joke about the name “ringing a bell”, which is a reference to The Magician’s Nephew.
• The book is dedicated to Joy so I asked about her involvement in the writing of the book.
• I asked about the meaning behind the book’s epigraph “Love is too young to know what conscience is”.
• Andrew told us about the initial reception to Till We Have Faces.
• I asked Andrew for his advice to those of us who haven’t read this book before.
• You can find out more about Andrew on MythOfLove.net, as well as on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
