Sister Malachi and C. S. Lewis

When I was a child growing up in Grand Rapids, my family lived about a block away from Aquinas College, a small liberal arts college located on a beautiful campus and run by Dominicans (it still is, I believe).

My mother was friends with the librarian, a wonderful nun who came from Ireland. She would go back to Ireland every once in a while--it was rumored to visit her brother who was a nobleman--and she would visit her friend C. S. Lewis.

So it was she who introduced us to Narnia after she brought us a copy of the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe signed by C. S. Lewis. My brother devoured the books; I was too scared at first (since I was only about 6 or 7) because I saw the pictures of the sacrifice on the Stone Table. But my brother loved them and talked about them all the time. He even wrote Lewis, asking him to write more Narnia stories beyond the Last Battle. Lewis wrote back and explained that he couldn't write any more, the stories had ended.

I finally read the series when I was 9 or 10 and have probably read them ever since at least once a year.

I am so grateful to Sister M. for introducing me to Lewis, and with him, to a love of good stories. And the contribution to my faith in God of these books, and later that of the Perelandra triology when I was a pre-teen and Til We Have Faces when I was in high school, was significant.

There's nothing like the gift of a good book at the right time to open a child's mind to the very thing to change their lives. I'm also grateful to my older brother, Dr. Lee Harrington, for making it impossible for me to not pick these books up and persevere.