A Week of Dickens: “The Life of Our Lord” by Charles Dickens

Was Charles Dickens religious?

It’s a question that comes up now and then. Overt religious themes and characters seem to be rare in his novels and stories, while religious themes like redemption, salvation, and the wages of sin are common. Biographies generally give the subject short shrift, and it may be that the biographers themselves aren’t that interested.

Five years ago, academic Gary Colledge published God and Charles Dickens: Rediscovering the Christian Voice of a Classic Author, and made the claim that Dickens was, indeed, a conventional Christian. He made a good case – certainly he promoted Christian themes and ideas in his novels, stories, articles, and letters. He had been raised a nominal Anglican, and for a time affiliated with the Unitarians. And there’s the question of the big scandal of his later life, when he pensioned off his wife of more than 20 years so he could be with his much younger mistress, actress Ellen Ternan.

Colledge and others have pointed to a manuscript that wasn’t published until 1934. When his children were young, and over a period covering the years 1846 to 1849, Dickens wrote a version of the gospel story. He meant it for his children alone; on his death, the manuscript went to his sister-in-law, Georgina Hogarth, who had lived with Dickens and the children after he forced his wide out (and caused a break with her own family as a result). From Georgina, the manuscript passed from child to child until 1933, when Sir Henry Dickens, the last remaining child, died. The manuscript was published the next year under the title of The Life of Our Lord.

At first glance, the narrative seems straightforward enough, and is clearly based on the gospel story as told in the Bible. There are some differences, and they’re not insignificant. There is clearly an emphasis on good behavior (do good and you will go to heaven” and more of Jesus as a great and good man and less Jesus as the Son of God. The children were read this story when they were very young, so it’s a question how much heavy theological content they would have absorbed. Still, the account is not entirely orthodox.

Charles Dickens

Still, it’s a charming account, and it’s interesting to imagine a man like Dickens reading this story to his very young children.

I have a first American edition from 1934, and it contains an inscription on the flyleaf: “For Faithful & Prompt Attendance, Second Mile Class, Grace M.E. Church, January 1935 – July 1935. Sincerely, Mrs. C.B. Poston.” The book was obviously given as a Sunday School attendance reward or prize. The Grace United Methodist Church has been in the same location in the Central West End of St. Louis since 1892, and was located in downtown St. Louis before that.

His statements of faith can be seen as at odds with many of the things he did in life, including his treatment of his wife, Catherine. At the same time, the causes he fought for and infused in his novels and articles reflected his strong senses of justice and compassion. In the end, he was a man, with the strengths and frailties common to all of us.

Related:

My review of Gary Colledge’s God and Charles Dickens.

A discussion of Dickens and religion at Rick Wilcox’s Literary Life blog.

Top photograph: Charles Dickens with two of his children, Katie and Mamie.

Gary Colledge’s “God and Charles Dickens”

I love the writings of Charles Dickens. How could I pass up a book with a title like this one?

In writing God and Charles Dickens: Rediscovering the Christian Voice of a Classic Author, Gary Colledge has aimed at restoring an understanding of the Christian faith embedded in the novels and writings of this nineteenth century literary icon. And it’s no easy task.

The matter of Dickens and faith or religion has been buried under more than a century of modernist and post-modernist interpretation, and only recently (a 2009 biography) even addressed with more than a passing reference. There are also the matters of Dickens’s fulminations against the established church and the relationships with both his wife Catharine and actress Ellen Ternan.

Colledge, an adjunct professor at Moody Bible Institute and Walsh University, is the author of the previously published Dickens, Christianity, and “The Life of Our Lord.” He brings considerable knowledge and understanding, not to mention a full reading of Dickens’s works, to his subject, and it is the body of writing by Dickens that Colledge builds his case upon. And I believe he makes his case.

The key writing Colledge draws upon is the gospel story Dickens wrote for his children – and never intended to be published -- The Life of Our Lord. This is what Dickens taught his children, and it is about as orthodox as you’ll find.

But the author goes beyond only this one work, and examines Dickens’s understanding of Jesus, theology, and the church, using letters, public statements, and his novels. Colledge also spends considerable time examining what Dickens would describe as “real Christianity” – the gospel in action in culture and society. If he was nothing else, Dickens was certainly a champion for social justice, both in his fiction and in his life.

Colledge also tackles Dickens’s personal relationships. The story of his marriage is well known – he essentially dismissed his wife who had born so many children and never spoke to her again. He spent some considerable time with actress Ellen Ternan, and in fact was with Ternan when he was involved in the famous Steeplehurst railroad wreck (Dickens discreetly dispatched Ternan and her mother in a carriage back to London while he stayed at the accident scene). Colledge makes no apology for Dickens’s treatment of his wife, and sees it as a serious human flaw and failing. But he doesn’t see it as negating Dickens’s faith.

The author makes his case, and convincingly reclaims the faith of this great author. I checked several biographies of Dickens to see what attention had been paid to faith and religion, and Colledge is correct – it’s been given short shrift.

God and Charles Dickens is a welcome understanding of what Charles Dickens believed, how he practiced his belief, and how it infused his writings.