Screwtape’s Plan for Pulverizing Pastors
Editor's note: This article is written in the vein of The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis, in which a senior demon addresses his nephew, Wormwood.
My Dear Wormwood,
I’m amazed at how quickly you are ready to throw in the towel. You’d think this was your first year tormenting pitiful human souls. Yes, it is indeed a setback that your pathetic subject has been promoted into the ministry of our Enemy and been accepted as a shepherd at one of his outposts. But this is no time for self-pity.
Have you forgotten the legends of your great uncle Boilskin and the masterful successes he had with some enemy ministers of old? While you are now working with a subject perhaps a bit above your pay grade, there are advanced tactics you can use against him.
His parish—or congregation, whatever term is in fashion these days, I can’t keep track—has vetted him well and made sure he meets those dreaded qualifications the Enemy holds in high esteem among his underlings. When we’ve been unable to trip up a pastor there, we’ve had great success in targeting those within his own household.
USE HIS TEACHING AS YOUR TOOL
Here’s the method Boilskin has perfected: Make sure your subject’s zeal for teaching is prioritized. It seems counterintuitive to encourage him to study the Enemy’s playbook, but there are some possible advantages to this. The first is that over time you may find he begins to confuse knowledge of the Enemy with intimacy with him. If you’re able to hoodwink him into puffing himself up with knowledge, you’ll bolster his pride under the guise of devotion.
“If you can convince him to prioritize reading books over praying, you’re on your way to winning the war.”
If you’re able to subtly suggest it is more fruitful to read books about The Book while neglecting The Book itself, you’ve won half the battle! If you can convince him to prioritize reading books over praying, you’re on your way to winning the war.
Another way this can work to your advantage is if you can get your subject to love teaching more than his family. This is how to gain the upper hand in his life. There are, in fact, a few scenarios here that can work to your advantage.
One is that he could spend all his time “preparing to feed the sheep” that he neglects to feed first the members of his own household. So seize him in his study. Squeeze out his time for family devotions. Keep him tied up in meetings so his children will—ever so slowly—feel alone.
We have had quite the success in creating embittered pastor’s kids who felt neglected by their own fathers, and as a result, abandoned everything having to do with the Enemy. I almost scream in delight just thinking about it! Some of our most devoted subjects are the scorned children of shepherds.
“Some of our most devoted subjects are the scorned children of shepherds.”
There is an additional benefit in fanning the flames of his passion for serving the Enemy’s people. At times, we have utilized the sheep themselves to consume their own shepherds. In fact, this is more common than you’d think.
Keep urging this poor subject to neglect his own family in the name of “ministry.” Coax him to stay at the office one more hour. Make sure he recalls that extra visit on the way home. Stress that he be present at that event—don’t have him send another member. We’ll have some of our new recruits work on some of his flock. You focus on keeping him busy so his eyes remain off the Enemy.
REMIND HIM OF THE NEED TO BE NEEDED
Over time, we’ll make his so-called flock so dependent on him they’ll look to him to meet needs that only the Enemy himself can truly meet. Remember, your subject loves to feel needed. Oh, how easily they can be convinced that their own worth comes not from their Master, but from the congregation they’re supposed to bring to their Master! Work on your subject to create in him a need to be needed.
“Subtly there is a shift from the shepherd feeding the sheep to the sheep feeding upon the shepherd himself, and before they know it, they are doing our work for us.”
We’ll have others work on his congregation to create demands that can only be met if he sacrifices his family. Your subject will grovel in the face of such an impossible dilemma. Whisper to him how unhappy his congregants will be if he says, “No.” A great victory can be celebrated if we are able to create within him the sense that he is needed by everyone and yet unable to truly meet anyone’s needs.
Many enter “ministry” with ambitions of helping others; we quickly create in them a hunger to be the center of attention. We work the other angle in the flock so that individual members always have a reason to call upon their pastor and make unreasonable requests of him. Subtly there is a shift from the shepherd feeding the sheep to the sheep feeding upon the shepherd himself, and before they know it, they are doing our work for us.
BOLSTER HIS VIRTUAL EGO
You no longer need a good book or newspaper column to distract humans from the Enemy. Simply get him to unlock his phone. Have him waste time disagreeing with people he hardly knows online. Technology has been a helpful tool in our magnification of human ego. We’ve been able to exploit their pitiful desire for platform. Text messages, emails, and video conferences have done a great job of convincing both pastors and their flocks that the limits imposed on creatures by their Creator can be transcended.
Our great Overlord himself even made his way into their Book with this greatest of our tactics; it’s amazing they still don’t see it coming. We simply whisper in their ears, “Do you want to be like God? Well, he is all-present, you know. You can be too!”
If they rebut these whispers with talk of Sabbath or family time, cast doubt as our Father has taught us to. Let him become so enamored with the task of working for his Master that he completely neglects time with his Master.
He will never come right out and admit that he believes he, too, can become omnipresent. But he will willingly enter into the carrot race of chasing every notification his smartphone gives him.
FIGHT THE DARK FIGHT
Above all, remember dear nephew that this advanced war your waging is won, not overnight, but over decades. Keep him busy at all costs. Convince him his people need him more than the Master he serves. You can, with enough hard work, convince a “Kingdom employee” to sacrifice his own soul to gain earthly rewards. You will find much satisfaction in this, for it is one of the most advanced lies we sell. However, our own kingdom was founded on just such a lie.
I hope this was of some encouragement to you. It may be worth writing to old Boilskin himself, although you may find he still hasn’t forgotten your last foible, of which you may have to pay dearly. For that, even I could not help you.
Don’t mess up this time, for you know our Master treats failure severely.
Your affectionate uncle,
Screwtape
Sean Nolan is a GCD Staff Writer that grew up in New York’s capital region. He married the girl that told him about Jesus and they have three children together. After three years pastoring in the suburbs of Baltimore he is returning to Albany to plant Engage Church.