I've been reading Augustine's Confessions for another class, and one of the things that has struck me most is the way that he speaks about evil, especially evil that he committed in his past. He colors it all as completely unappealing, even when he's describing something that is actually enjoyable (sex, for example). It's very humble, I suppose, to complete condemn your past actions and reject the fact that you sinned. I get that.
But it's really shitty storytelling.
You can't understand why somebody did/believed something unless you can understand why it was attractive in the first place. (Okay, maybe sex isn't a good example--that one's obvious.) But, like, Manichaean philosophy. Tell me what the truth in it is, so that I can better understand where it falls short...
I think that's a big problem in literature, fiction and non-fiction, that's produced by Christians. I don't really know how to fix it, but you have to portray the evil choice, the harmful choice, as attractive enough that a fairly average human being could believably choose it. Understanding what the kernel of good is in a desire is something Christians should probably be good at doing if, as Augustine says, "evil" is simply a privation of good.
Incidentally, I think Dostoevsky is really, really good at it.
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