Christian or non-Christian?

The one principle of hell is---"I am my own."  (George MacDonald)

In C. S. Lewis' autobiography, Surprised by Joy, he traces his long and very gradual conversion from atheism to belief, at one point commenting, And so the great Angler played His fish, and I never dreamed the hook was in my tongue.

Later, in writing Mere Christianity, he was to say this, based on his own experience:

The world does not consist of 100% Christians and 100% non-Christians.  There are people who are slowly ceasing to be Christians but who still call themselves by that name; some of them are clergymen.  There are other people who are slowly becoming Christians though they do not yet call themselves so.  There are people who do not accept the full Christian doctrine about Christ but who are so strongly attracted by Him that they are His in a much deeper sense than they themselves understand.  There ae people in other religions who are being led by God's secret influence to concentrate on those parts of their religion which are in agreement with Christianity, and who thus belong to Christ without knowing it....Many of the good pagans long before Christ's birth may have been in this position.  And always, of course, there are a great many people who are just confused in mind and have a lot of inconsistent beliefs all jumbled up together.  Consequently, it is not much use trying to make judgents about Christians and non-Christians in the mass.

It is some use comparing cats and dogs, or even men and women, in the mass, because there one knows definitely which is which.  Also, an animal does not turn (either slowly or suddenly) from a dog into a cat.  But when we are comparing Christians in general with non-Christians in general, we are usually not thinking about real people whom we know at all, but only about two vague ideas which we have got from novels and newspapers.

Lewis' experience and concept is a good reminder to anchor our ideas in the concrete.  As Flannery O'Connor reminds us, if we fail to grasp the details rightly, the principle will always elude us.