MALE SPEAKER: Good
afternoon, and welcome
to Talks at Google in
Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Today, it's my great pleasure
to introduce a representative
from the collective
known as Frank Schaeffer.
I say collective because
it seems unlikely
that one person could
have amassed a CV that
includes all of the following.
Born into a family of
prominent evangelicals,
and helping them found the
religious right in the United
States.
Rejecting that
political point of view,
and becoming a vocal
enemy of the Tea Party,
directing slasher movies,
becoming a "New York Times"
best-selling author of both
fiction and nonfiction,
becoming a visual
artist whose work
has been shown and
collected around the world,
a frequent guest on "The Rachel
Maddow Show," with appearances
on "Oprah," the "Today" show,
"Fresh Air," and "BBC News."
An in-demand
lecturer who's spoken
at Princeton, The Kennedy
School of Government at Harvard.
A no longer terrible father, and
a pretty darn good grandfather.
But most of all, a thoughtful,
reflective observer
of the human condition
in our relation
to spirituality, religion,
art, and the universe.
I left of surviving
polio and becoming
a member of a Greek Orthodox
Church, and many other things.
There just isn't time.
Please join me in
welcoming Frank Schaeffer.
[APPLAUSE]
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Hi, thanks
for coming out today.
I just live up the road here
in Salisbury, Massachusetts,
so it was a short drive
down, and a pleasure
to be here with you.
I'm going to read a
little bit from this book,
"Why I'm an Atheist
Who Believes in God."
The first thing I'll
do is just mention
the subtitle is "How to Give
Love, Create Beauty, and Find
Peace."
So let me tell you a
little bit about why
I wrote this book as
opposed to some other book,
or another novel, or
whatever it might be.
I wrote a memoir seven
or eight years ago
called "Crazy for
God" that's tracked
my journey that was
referred to a little bit
in the introduction.
I'd written a number
of novels, and I'd
been in Hollywood, where
I'd made four feature films
after I left the
evangelical world.
And I had done everything except
address my personal journey
away from the religious right,
why I left that environment.
I'd been my dad's sidekick
for a while, flown around
in Jerry Falwell's jet
when the moral majority was
getting going.
We had been frequenters
of the White House
when Reagan was there, and
Ford, Bush one, and so forth.
So we had been, as a family,
very much invested in that.
And kind of like Hollywood,
the evangelical world
has a lot of nepotism in it.
And so it seemed
natural at the time--
although now looking back it
seems very curious to me--
that I was groomed to be
my father's successor.
I mean, how does that work?
Only the British royal family
and the mob works that way.
But evangelicalism
also has that.
Where the God business
becomes a family business.
And so when I was
17, 18 years old,
I began working with
my dad on producing
a couple of documentary
films, which then went out
into the evangelical world.
One was called "How
Should We Then Live?"
And another, "Whatever Happened
to the Human Race?" that we
made with Doctor C. Everett
Koop, who then became Ronald
Reagan's Surgeon General.
And by the time those film
series had been presented
in nationwide seminar
tours, playing auditoriums
like the Grand Ole Opry
or Madison Square Garden,
and large venues like this
where we were packing 10, 12, 15
thousand people
in a night, my dad
became a household name
not in the larger world,
but in the evangelical ghetto.
And I, as his young
sidekick-- and this
is a long time ago in the
late '70s and early '80s--
became this kind of
a person who is going
to, put in the
evangelical terms,
receive the mantle of his
anointed prophetic ministry,
or however they
would have put it.
One day in the mid 1980s,
after he died in 1984,
through a series of things that
I write about in this memoir,
"Crazy for God," I
came to the conclusion
that I had really taken a
very drastically wrong step
with my life.
For one thing, I was turning
into a complete asshole
at home.
I was hating every
moment on the road.
I had two little young
children at the time,
and realized that I'd been
away six months of the year,
doing God's work.
Talking all over the place.
And also had a real series
of spiritual crisises
where I just simply
did not believe
what we were saying anymore.
And so I really faced a
dilemma, because I didn't have
any other way to earn a living.
I had run away from a
British private school,
where I was in boarding school.
I'd gone home and become
part of my dad's ministry.
I painted, and I was
showing some paintings,
and pretty precocious
in that field.
But nevertheless,
this is what I did.
And the money was good.
There is a lot of money
in the God business,
in case you're
not aware of that.
And so I didn't know
what would happen here.
But in this personal crisis
that I write about in "Crazy
for God," I came
to the conclusion
that it was really this way,
the path out, or sanity.
I couldn't do both things.
And I couldn't do a
marriage and fatherhood,
and live a life of complete
hypocrisy of gradually drifting
away from the core beliefs we
were selling both politically,
and also religiously.
And so I got out as far as you
can get away from the enclave
that I was part of.
This nepotistic inheritance of
the Schaeffer little empire,
which it was at that time.
And all the access
to power that we had.
Dad and mom staying
in the White House
frequently, mother going
as Betty Ford's guest
to swim in the White
House pool any time
she was in Washington,
yada, yada, yada.
And so I went to Hollywood, and
we were living in Massachusetts
already at that time.
And I rented a little
studio apartment,
and used the footage
that I had cut out
of these religious documentaries
I'd made to make a show reel.
And went off and
got myself an agent,
and wound up directing
four low budget Hollywood
movies that if you
stay up very late
and go to shitty cable
stations, you'll see.
They're not very good.
But it was work, and it
got me over the hump.
And then I happened to write
a novel called "Portofino,"
which, very fortunately for me,
got some really great reviews.
And got published
all over the world,
and gave me permission to
continue to be a writer.
And I'd finally found something
that I was actually quite good
at, as opposed to these second
rate movies I was making.
As opposed to this weird
world I had just walked away
from in terms of the
evangelical ministry.
And 15 books later or
so, I'm still writing.
And after this memoir came
out, which I got around
to writing when I
was in my mid 50s,
not having wanted to
address the issue of why
I left the evangelical world
and my family's history before.
Because there are a lot of
people who revere the Schaeffer
name out there in kind of a
guru presence kind of way.
I don't mean my Schaeffer
name, but my father's.
And I hadn't wanted
to just put up
with the bullshit that would
be coming over the transom,
especially in the post internet
age of email and messaging
and all the rest of it.
And so I kind of, OK,
I'll write another novel,
and I'll write on this
subject, and that subject.
And when my son went
into the Marine Corps
and fought in
Afghanistan, I wrote
a book called "Keeping Faith,
A Father-Son Story About Love
in the United States
Marine Corps."
I had never served,
it wasn't political.
And that got me on "Oprah,"
and it became a bestseller,
and so forth and so on.
But I kept pushing
back this question,
even though I got a lot of
email from people saying,
when are you going
to tell your story?
What I did tell it, the book
came out and did quite well.
Terry Gross did an hour
program on Fresh Air
on it, and so forth, and so on.
But one of the
things that happens,
I struck up an
email correspondence
with Christopher Hitchens,
who was a leading new atheist
author, you may
have heard of him,
along with Dawkins and
others who write these very
anti-religious books.
And Christopher
Hitchens liked the book,
and he started writing to me
while he was reading it saying,
you're good writer,
and so forth.
And it was very nice,
because I respected him
and his writing and debating
skills, and so forth.
But when he got to
the end of the book,
he actually called me one time.
And he said, you know,
I'm really disappointed.
Because you left the
evangelical world,
and as I was
reading this book, I
thought you were going
to come over to our side.
He saw things very much
in black and white terms.
And instead, I get there,
and you end the book,
and you're indecisive, and
it sounds as if you're still
a spiritual person.
Why didn't you leave all
this nonsense behind?
Why do you still
have this interest
in spirituality, albeit not
of the evangelical variety?
Interestingly enough, I was
getting quite a bit of email
from evangelicals who
didn't like the book,
and I was getting
quite a bit of email
from people who were following
Chris Hitchens, although I
was talking to him
himself in this case.
And what I noticed
was on the subject
lines in the first
lines of these emails--
aside from the ones
that just told me
what I could go do with
myself, but I'm talking
about the ones I read on pass
the expletives-- if you changed
a word or two, they
were the same email.
They were from people
who were, in my mind,
increasingly as I
tried to identify what
the hell's going on here, what I
came to call certainty addicts.
They want everything
nailed down.
And I was starting
to think about what
became the subject of
"Why I'm an Atheist Who
Believes in God."
Which was that as I'm
getting older, anyway,
and have raised
three grown children,
and have five
grandchildren, three of whom
live across the street from me
up in Salisbury Massachusetts
that I do daycare every day for
as a stay at home grandfather.
The more I have lived
and experienced things,
the more I've understood
that paradox is essentially
the fulcrum upon which all
human life and experience turns.
If you don't embrace paradox,
you are royally fucked,
basically.
Because everything is going
to slam you in the face,
taking away whatever that last
certainty was that you had,
until you suddenly
discover that you're not
so sure about what you
thought you were sure about.
And having been on
a bit of a journey
spiritually, and professionally,
and emotionally-- not
to mention fatherhood,
when I got Genie pregnant
when we were 17 and 18,
and then had these kids,
so that my oldest granddaughter
is the age of my friends'
children who waited longer,
and so forth and so on.
But all this experience
added up to what
I write about in this book.
So I want to share
a little bit of it,
just some passages
not chosen randomly,
but kind of build a
picture of what's here.
And I'll just start with
one at the beginning,
though the book has more
stories in it than it
does this nonfiction narrative.
But let me just
sum up a little bit
of what I was just saying
as I write it in the book.
And this is in a
way my answer to
both my fundamentalist
friends on the right
in the evangelical world, and
my fundamentalist friends--
and I don't mean that
facetiously, people
who are my friends on
the left, and the Chris
Hitchens of this world,
though sadly, he's gone.
And I guess you could call
this book and extended answer
to many, many emails.
My kaleidoscopic
beliefs are fickle,
and motivated by desire,
wishful thinking,
and wanting to fit with
my family and community
and make my marriage work.
My dogmatic
declarations of faith
once provided statuss-- ego
stroking power over others,
and a much better
income than I've ever
earned since fleeing
the evangelical machine.
Certainty made things
simple, gave me an answer
to every question,
and paid the bills.
With the acceptance
of paradox came
a new and blessed
uncertainty that
begin to heal the mental
illness called certainty.
The kind of certainty
they told me
that my job was to
be head of a home,
and to order around
my wife and children
because the Bible says so.
Embracing paradox
helped me discover
that religion is a neurological
disorder for which faith
is the only cure.
These days, I hold to ideas
about God simultaneously.
He, she, or it exists, and
he, she, or it doesn't exist.
I don't seesaw between these
opposites, I embrace them.
I don't view this
embrace as requiring
a choice between mere
emotion and fact,
or between evolutionary
biology and spirituality.
Reality can't be
so neatly parsed.
Neuroscientists who analyze
our chemistry-based brains
still fall in love.
Preachers claiming
a literal view
of the Bible and
so-called young earth
still use petroleum
products only found
because geologists operate
on the premise of the earth
is 4.54 billion years old.
I don't view my
embrace of opposites
as a kind of
agnosticism, I view it
is the way things actually are.
An agnostic neither believe,
nor disbelieves in God.
I'm not that person.
I believe and don't
believe at the same time.
So that sets up something here.
Now I want to go to a little
passage which really tells
the same story of
growth and uncertainty,
but in a different context.
In a sense of growing away from
the certainties about career
path, and the picture I had
of what success is all about,
and how I would more
measure that today.
Picking up Lucy and Jack from
kindergarten and preschool--
Lucy's now seven
and Jack is five,
but this was written when they
were a little younger-- has
evolved into a happy ritual.
I prepare snacks for them
to eat on the way home.
Usually sliced apples or
cheese and crackers for Jack,
and a banana or black olives
and sliced tomatoes for Lucy.
The 20 minute drive home
often includes a stop
to watch the 109 New [INAUDIBLE]
to Boston train hurdle
under the bridge on Route 1A.
Jack loves trains.
When we wave, the driver sounds
his bell and blows his horn,
and Jack shouts, hi, Joe.
He knows the driver's name
from his many visits with Genie
to the New [INAUDIBLE]
Station to watch the trains.
One day, just after
returning from preschool,
the grandchildren were
in the kitchen painting
on butcher paper when a friend
phoned, I'll call him Sam.
Sam is a successful movie
producer in Hollywood
whom I worked with when I was
directing movies in the 1980s.
Although I quit the movie
business in the early 1990s
after I wrote "Portofino"
and it was published,
thus offering me a passport to
a little artistic satisfaction
and vindication, Sam and
I are still close friends.
We bickered over our
philosophical differences
and exchanged insults for years.
Sam asked me what I was doing.
I'd just picked
up the grandkids.
I said without
thinking, I added,
I love hanging out with
the other young mothers
at preschool.
Sam paused as he
processed my words.
The other young mothers?
He said and laughed.
The other young mothers?
I laughed too, though my
remark made sense to me.
When I pick up Jack and
Lucy, I'm one of the few men,
and the only grandfather
at the preschool.
Because Lucy's kindergarten
ends half an hour
after Jack's
preschool, Jack and I
have time to play
in the hall, or
outside in the schoolyard
while moms and a few dads
come and go.
At first, the mothers
couldn't figure me out.
Why was this old
guy hanging around?
Why was he unshaved
with unkempt hair,
and torn jeans, and paint
all over his clothes?
Should someone call the police?
After seeing me every day
for a year, the moms knew me.
Some know that I'm a
writer and an artist,
so the paint spattered
look is accepted.
One mom checked me out
online, and discovered
I'd been interviewed by
Oprah and Terry Gross
on NPR's "Fresh Air."
Even a minor celebrity is
accorded some eccentric artist
slack, at least in the
arts-friendly Boston area.
I could show up in my
bathrobe and slippers,
and no one would mind.
I'm just one of the gang,
albeit somewhat of a character.
The mothers and I
discuss one child's cold,
and how fast the rest of
us are likely to catch it.
We commiserate about the
latest pinkeye blight.
We talk about one child
who wakes up in the night,
and celebrate the quantum
leap another little girl
made with her drawing
skills after discovering
chalk pastels.
We note who is pregnant with
her second or third child,
and share strategies for helping
a little boy who was scared
of pooping because
he's sure something
is down there in the toilet.
We congratulate one mom
for finally getting a job
with health care
insurance benefits,
and commiserate with another
about the challenging child
care schedule of a night nurse.
Some of the mothers are
stay at home parents,
while others hurry away
from the office at lunchtime
to meet their child, deliver
her to the babysitter,
and race back to work.
Some have told me about problems
with teenage step children,
previous marriages,
divorces, and their struggles
to fit into New England
after moving from friendlier
parts of the country.
Some moms arrive in old cars,
while others drive new SUVs.
No matter what we drive
or earn, or if we're
married, black, brown, white,
single, gay, heterosexual
or divorced, when we
get down on our knees
at eye level with our babies
as they run into our arms,
we understand each
other perfectly.
The child we're meeting
touches the core of our being.
Every mom delights in the
pint-sized human shouting,
hi, mommy.
The shouted greeting that
makes my heart skip is hi, Ba.
I'm called Ba.
Our shared experience
of vulnerability
erases the age and
gender differences
between the young
mothers and me.
We share a fearful solidarity,
call it the flip side of love.
If anything awful were happened
to the child clambering
into our arms, the universe
as we know it would end.
And so, with a passage
like that, what I try to do
is something that
I see too little
of in a lot of writing about
philosophy and religion, which
all is part of the
certainty addiction.
it does not embrace the paradox.
And that is, it puts it in these
didactic intellectual terms
that is not where anybody lives.
And what we all care about is
our version of Lucy and Jack,
whether we're married or
single, gay, straight,
whatever it may be.
We have in our lives a
completely different dynamic
than the official belief system
that we say we subscribe to.
And it has to do with
the people we love,
and what we actually care
about, and what makes us tick.
And so what I've tried
to do in this book
is be as honest as
I can about that,
and not keep trying to act as
if I have some omniscient view
to share with people that
will lead them to my truth
as if somehow that's
an exclusive truth.
And to get away from
that, I do two things.
I write in this way as a
novelist, as a storyteller,
but I also then come
back and describe
what I believe or don't
believe the way the earlier
passage landed that I
read at the beginning.
So I want to conclude just
by going to something here
at the back of the
book when I talk
about the publication
of this book.
Which, by the way, is
one of the first books
that I actually at
first self published,
and then it was picked up by a
small publisher, which I think
is the edition you've got here.
But in the beginning,
I did this because it
was a book that didn't fit in
with the new atheist movement,
or the religion movement,
which I think I talked
about in this passage here.
Spirituality is
overtaking commerce,
while commerce looks
more and more like art.
The kind of art the Medici
or Irving Penn Homer or Miles
Davis would have understood.
In which artists and observer
comprehend one another,
even respect each other,
and speak a common language.
More young people, and
a few old ones like me,
binge-stream
made-for-TV programs
like Netflix's
traditionally crafted,
Shakespearean-inspired
"House of Cards"
or the brilliant Australian
show, one of my favorites,
"Rake," than will visit
Tate Modern or the Whitney
in a year.
Maybe the future
no longer belongs
to the anti-meaning ideologues.
Shakespeare is produced
tens of thousands of times
more than the absurdist plays.
Miles Davis lasted,
John Cage didn't.
Duchamp's original
urinal got lost,
and had to be replaced by one
crafted by a ceramic artist.
The museum wanted to
keep their investment
in a piece of art that was
meant to mock the art market.
The found object became
the made investment.
Damien Hirst's reputation is
rotting, along with his sharks.
Daniel Dennett has a following,
but even his followers behave
as if their lives have a
deeper meaning than plant
life, no matter what he
says to the countrary.
And modern delivery systems
are bypassing the critics
and gatekeepers.
Who needs another rotting shark
in a tank of formaldehyde,
or a hank of cloth hung
from the Whitney ceiling
as a statement of
something or other,
when you come watch "QI," the
wonderful British comedy quiz
show, on YouTube, for free?
It's hosted by Stephen
Fry, a greatly talent
a defender of good
writing and music.
Who would have guessed his
musical hero is Wagner?
A new generation is
embracing human connection
rather than debunking it.
The liberating results are real.
The geeks, bless
them, are killing off
the jaded, cold
hearted gatekeepers.
When I was a young
artist in the 1970s,
I had to travel to gallery
after gallery with slides
in sweaty hand and beg for
a meeting with the owner
if I wanted to sell a painting.
If the owner loved my
work, I'd be invited back
a year or two
later, and he or she
would put a few
paintings in a show.
I wandered off into the movie
business and quit painting.
When I resumed painting in
2006, I worked for eight years
until I liked my work
enough to show it.
I started a website in 2014,
and now sell art directly
to collectors.
There are no
gatekeepers in sight.
It's just me directly in touch
with people who like my work.
The same goes for my writing.
I self-published this book.
Given the bestselling status
of some of my previous books,
several of my former
publishers and
several religious
publishers were
interested in publishing it.
However, they wanted
me to craft this book
to fit their
marketing strategies.
Does it go on the new atheist,
or the religion shelf?
They asked.
Can you rewrite it to fit
one market or the other
so we can sell it?
My answer was no.
Yet you are reading
the book I wrote.
I don't view you as
a market segment.
I view you as my partner,
an individual reader,
a friend as complex and maybe
even as conflicted as I am.
Why should either
of us fit anywhere?
My liberators in
Silicon Valley have
freed me to write
for you directly,
and to say what I want to say
to anyone I want to say it to.
The internet and its
innovators are doing more
to facilitate the reemergence
of content-laden, craft-rich,
hands-on art,
individuality, and perhaps
even spirituality, than all
the galleries, agents, critics,
churches, and
publishers combined.
So I'll end my reading
there, and you've
heard a little bit of my talk.
And I'd like to do
a Q&A, because I
find it's much more
interesting to find out
what you're interested in
than just rant on up here
about what I do.
So if you have questions, by
the way, I can repeat them.
So if you don't feel like
staggering up to a mic,
just shout them out,
and they don't have
to be about anything I said.
They can be about
writing, or what
it was like making crappy
movies in Hollywood
in the '80s, or anything
else you want to talk about.
But if you have a
question, please let me
know and I'll try to answer it.
AUDIENCE: Hi
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Hi.
AUDIENCE: Great talk.
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Thank you.
What's your name?
AUDIENCE: My name is Jordan.
FRANK SCHAEFFER:
Nice to meet you.
Thanks for coming today.
AUDIENCE: How do you
write your books?
FRANK SCHAEFFER:
How in what sense?
AUDIENCE: Do you have a
process that you follow?
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Yes, I do.
Actually, I'm disciplined not
by choice, but just by insomnia.
So I've done on a weird
schedule that has nothing
to do with our time zone.
I wake up at about 3
o'clock in the morning.
I find that if I write from
about 3:00 until 7:00 or 8:00,
it's my best work.
Mainly because I know I won't
be disturbed, as in nothing else
is happening.
So other than a couple fishing
boats that I see go by at 4:00
in the morning, or
5:00 in the morning,
just psychologically knowing
the phone isn't going to ring,
or can't ring, or won't, or
that if I've turned it off,
I'm not missing a call from
something I want to do,
because no one else is
up, is very helpful.
So I write early, I write
every day, seven days a week.
I'm superstitious,
I don't miss a day.
I wrote this morning.
I was up at 3:00,
and then my son
came up and helped me install a
new window that's been leaking,
and we finally got that put in.
I've been working on this
building project for a week
or so now, and then I came
down here to give the talk.
But the writing had to happen.
Even though I'm saying
this makes no sense,
it's going to make
a crazy long day,
I couldn't sleep if I wanted to,
because I'm on that clock now.
So that's how I do it.
It's just chunk, chunk, chunk.
Some days, it's shit,
some days it works.
But I got to get
something down, otherwise
it's like the day didn't happen.
AUDIENCE: Can I ask a follow-up?
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Sure, yeah.
AUDIENCE: OK.
You mentioned that it seemed
like what you've found
is that when you're reading
pieces that people write,
sometimes they take this
approach where they're not
writing about themselves,
they're writing about,
and this is what God
is in my viewpoint,
and they don't really relate
it through their experiences.
How do you make yourself
part of the story?
How do you make it personal,
or is that just how you write?
FRANK SCHAEFFER: No, I don't
look to make it personal,
it's just the way I write.
So really, I only write
two kinds of books.
I write fiction, and
the fiction is usually
based on something
that's happened to me.
So it's thinly veiled.
Like I had one sister who didn't
speak to me for five years,
because she was saying
they'll think it's us.
And then but it's
different, and I said,
well, it's different
because it's a novel.
And she's saying, yeah,
but they'll still be like,
they'll think it's
us, and so forth.
So that's the quandary
of all writers.
But I happen to process
my life into my writing
pretty directly,
even in the fiction.
I have a novel out
called "And God
Said Billy, about
a guy who comes out
of a fundamentalist background.
He's trying to make crappy
movies, he goes to South Africa
where I was.
He happens to make a movie
in Namibia, which I did.
So there's a lot of cheating,
because I'm using my stuff.
But on the other hand, I think
even science fiction writers
do.
Say they're writing
a relationship,
they still have
wives, and husbands,
and girlfriends, and
lovers, and they're
putting it all in there.
So if you know a writer,
you're going to see yourself
in his or her book.
You probably don't
want to tell them much.
But when it comes
to my nonfiction,
I just find that I have
limited myself to try--
and I know this
sounds pretentious,
but I actually try to be honest.
And so if I don't
know, I say it.
I don't footnote the
nonfiction unless it's just
a historical reference
or something in something
like my memoirs so
people can follow up.
And basically, If I'm
going to write about it,
I try to actually have
it a conversation,
and not be protective in that.
So there's a certain
vulnerability,
and I think that actually
communicates with people.
Because if you're writing about
things from a point of view
of, like, here it is,
and I've made up my mind,
there's nothing
much left to say.
So I picture my reading
answering me somehow
and having a talk with me.
And I'm writing to
someone who I hope
when they read my
work understands
they have a right to argue.
And I hope they do.
I don't know if
that answers that.
Yeah?
AUDIENCE: Speaking of arguing.
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Yes, go ahead.
Just don't throw anything.
AUDIENCE: So it seems to
me like saying I accept
paradox is a bit of a cop out.
In the sense that
you can understand
there are cases where there
are apparent paradoxes, where
things look to be in conflict.
But if you look sideways,
you look at it the right way,
they're actually
not in conflict.
And you can resolve
paradoxes that way.
But to not actually
try to resolve it,
and just to say
these x and not x
seem to be both-- I just
am comfortable with them
both true at the same time.
I would almost feel
better about saying,
well, I'm not
comfortable with it,
but I don't know the
answer yet, as opposed
to just saying the answer
is that they're both true.
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Well,
that might be a better way
to put it.
I think if you read the book,
maybe I explain myself better
in the text.
You would find that
what I'm trying to say,
really, is-- I guess
the way to put this,
and I don't want
be a downer here,
but it's to
acknowledge mortality,
and the shortness of
time we have to make up
our mind about anything.
And so for instance,
just take the fact
that I got Genie pregnant
when we're 17 and 18.
Now we've been
together 45 years,
we have these kids
we're caring for.
And I love her, and
we have great times,
and all the rest of it.
I have no clue who those
people were back then.
So it wasn't a question of
good decisions, or planning.
It was just, when I said
I'll pull out, I lied.
And we got pregnant in an age
when, when you got pregnant,
you got married.
Especially if you're
an evangelical thing.
I mean, it was the
worst possible scenario.
So now you ask me, OK,
you've been married 45 years,
you must know something
about marriage.
No, I don't.
Anymore than I know about
how to define the word love.
If you ask me what
love means, it
means that I bring Genie
a cup of coffee in bed
once in a while.
It means some days
that I hate her
less than I would otherwise when
we've had another huge fight.
And so one of us slams
out, tires squeal,
and somebody comes back,
and you hate each other.
And love that day,
passionate in love for years,
means we hate each
other a little less.
That's it.
So when I'm saying
about embracing paradox,
I think really-- and you
make a good point-- what
I'm trying to say
is, the limitation
of our words to
describe actual meaning
is so vast that to say
with certainty things that
exclude other people when
it comes to religion,
and philosophy, and belief,
and so forth, and so on--
it's not that there's no truth.
I'm not talking about being
relativist in that sense--
but I'm saying that our
descriptions are very limited.
So I'll just give you one
other example of what I mean.
You know there's this
debate about whether Pluto
is a planet, or
whatever else it is.
But of course, Pluto doesn't
know it's being renamed.
So I think our human hubris
of thinking that because we've
named something, we own it.
Mathematicians work
in precise numbers.
But without mathematicians,
there would be no numbers.
They don't exist independently
of our description.
So really I just approach
truth the way a writer does.
And that is, I look
at it as a story.
All I have is my story,
I don't have truth.
And there's a lot of
ways to tell my story.
And I'm not going to
bash you over the head
and say I've nailed it.
So that's a circuitous way to
say, I hear what you're saying,
and I agree when it comes
to the logic of something.
But in terms of where
we human beings actually
exist when it comes to
saying what love is,
or who God is or isn't,
and all the rest of it,
we are feeling our way
along on a journey,
and we're not going to
get to the destination.
And I think that's the
difference between embracing
paradox and still enjoying the
beauty and the intrinsic worth
and the glory of life
experience of, say,
in a child, or a lover, or
sex, or whatever it may be.
That's where we
actually do our living.
So I'm just trying to
say, OK, pay no attention
to the man behind the curtain.
I've lived my life
amongst wizards.
Political wizards,
religious wizards,
and others who had their
systems and their truths.
All the ones I got to know
personally, me included,
turned out to have feet of clay.
And their descriptions
we're limited by the fact
that words are simply metaphor.
That ideas about truth
change, ideas about beauty
and aesthetics change.
That's all I'm trying to say.
AUDIENCE: Thank you.
FRANK SCHAEFFER:
Yeah, you're welcome.
Thanks for a good question.
Yeah?
AUDIENCE: So I think
Jonathan said that you're
a Greek Orthodox now?
FRANK SCHAEFFER: I go to
a Greek Orthodox church.
In fact, I can read you a little
something when we finish up
here about that experience.
AUDIENCE: So I just
want to, you know,
why you go to a Greek
Orthodox church?
What'd you get from it,
what does it do for you?
FRANK SCHAEFFER:
Well, you know, I'm
going to have to
get personal again.
Because the thing
is, for me, someone
who would expect a
theological answer,
I could have done
that 40 years ago
when I thought in those terms.
Today, I'll tell you the truth.
I was raised by a mother
who took me to church.
So I feel comfortable going
to some sort of community
based on religion.
That doesn't sound like a very
good philosophical answer.
But on the other
hand, and I'm not
saying this to you personally,
but I could put it this way.
Hey, mom raised me that way.
You got a problem with that?
Do you have a better
reason for doing anything?
It's like falling in love.
Why did I meet Genie?
Because I went downstairs
for dinner one night,
and she came to
this crazy community
my parents were running
called L'Abri Fellowship,
and she was a stunning hippie
princess from San Francisco.
She hadn't listened
to "Abbey Road,"
and I had it in
my basement room.
And we went down there,
and 45 years later, she's
still wondering what happened.
So that's how.
So I go to the Greek
Orthodox church
because I feel comfortable in a
religious setting of some-- OK.
Aesthetically, I love the
liturgy for the same reason
I like Shakespeare and
unfooled-around-with
productions.
So I don't want long sermons,
and people telling me
what they think.
I like that half
of it's in Greek,
and I don't understand it.
That fits with my idea about
not understanding anything.
And I happen to also
love, in the context
of my grandchildren, being
able to go to a place
where little old ladies swoop
them up, where they're growing
up in a community where
people know and love them,
tracking with them.
Because there's not enough
of that in anybody's life.
We live in these
compartments where
you're in school when you're
a kid, or you're a young adult
and you're doing your
career, or whatever it is.
I love it when one of
Lucy's dearest friends
is literally an
88-year-old lady who
lets her help decorate the
front of the church with her.
That's priceless.
And so partly community.
And then you come to
the mystical desire
to touch something
bigger than ourselves.
And that hasn't
gone away with me.
So I'm still on a search
for what that might be.
And I find the
solitude and the beauty
of the liturgical worship
service, which is anything
but original, but very ancient.
A fourth century liturgy of St.
John Chrysostom, originally.
For me personally,
with my taste that
has nothing to do with what
I'm telling anybody else do,
I find a quiet, contemplative
space within that structure.
It's all personal, it's
nothing to do with telling
anybody else what to do.
AUDIENCE: I guess
just to comment,
it seems to me like the
crucial thing is not
that you go to a
Greek Orthodox church,
but that you belong
to the community.
FRANK SCHAEFFER: I do.
And how else am I going to know
when [INAUDIBLE] isn't feeling
well, and how else will she
know that I just smashed
my finger with a hammer?
Get a close up of it right here.
And that it's growing back
again, in all seriousness.
And one of my best
friends in that church
is a night nurse that
I'd never meet otherwise,
because she never makes any day
things because she's sleeping.
But we would do
dishes every year
together at the food festival.
And we've become best friends.
Kathy and I are bosom buddies,
because we're sitting there
with greasy water
up to our elbows,
cleaning up after our
major fund-raising event.
That's church.
And you could name
it something else,
and it's totally available
to you if you're an atheist.
It's not a religious thing.
But I'm still
interested in religion.
I still find meaning in
prayers, and rituals.
And that is me.
But it's not a system
of certain beliefs,
it is a system of
the way of being.
Just like being a
father or grandfather
isn't about a theory
of fatherhood,
it's about, hey, when
you look at your child,
what do you see
written in their face?
Fear, or love?
That's the test, that's
the mirror, not the theory.
Yep?
AUDIENCE: So as you were saying,
you can certainly go to church
without believing in God.
Those can be related, but
they don't have to be.
But you were saying
you both believe in God
and don't believe in
God at the same time.
So aside from just saying I
believe or I don't believe,
how does that
affect what you do?
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Well, I'll tell
you exactly how it affects it.
It affects it in that
I will, in my brain,
whatever this amalgam of
brain chemistry and neurons
and everything else is here--
we don't even know what it is,
at least I don't-- when it comes
trying to give philosophical
answers that are certain,
I leave myself a way out.
Like the gentleman
quite truthfully said,
my idea's kind of a cop out.
It's a cop out.
It's a way not to deal with
what I can't deal with.
I'm ducking the issue.
But in my daily life, when
I get up in the morning,
the staircase down
from my attic bedroom,
I make my sign of the
cross, because I've
been in the Orthodox Church 30
years now, it feels natural.
And I pray for my
family on the way down.
I say, Lord, I
offer you this day.
It's a ritual.
And I say, Genie, Jessica,
Francise and John, Amanda, Ben,
Donnie, the Lucy,
Jack, Nora and Becky.
And that's my family,
and my daughter in law,
and all the rest.
I have remembered them in the
context of a holy sacred thing.
Now, whether that
answers any big question
about what's actually out there
is a whole different matter.
So it's the same thing when
I see an ambulance go by.
I make my sign of the cross.
I don't do it because I think
some miraculous healing will
occur.
It's because, God damn it,
a little human empathy never
killed anybody.
And it's my way of
expressing that.
It's in a religious context.
I hope there's
something out there.
I would like there to be.
I would like there to be a
witness to all the things we
go through.
And that is something
I still work through,
and I'm working on a new
book about creativity and art
in children which really draws
on that spiritual reference
point so many
artists have found.
But it's not trying to convince
anybody to believe anything.
I'm saying, look,
I'm an atheist who
believes in God in the
sense of describing
two halves of the same person.
And one of the reasons
I wrote this title was
to provoke a discussion
amongst certainty addicts who
say, yeah, but I'm sure
Jesus saved me from my sins
on one hand, or
on the other hand,
I'm sure there is no God because
I read Chris Hitchens' latest
book, or Dawkins,
or here's the latest
research on brain chemistry.
And I'm saying to myself, wow.
At what point in human
history could you
go back and draw a line under
some cosmological statement,
and say, OK, that's
it, they nailed it?
If we could do
that, we would not
continue to not only
advance and evolve,
but it's a hubristic
misunderstanding of where we
are on the evolutionary chain.
And where we are on
the evolutionary chain,
I mean-- it's funny to be saying
this in the middle of Google,
that has such a sophisticated
footprint worldwide in terms
of not only technology,
but so many good things.
The truth of the matter is
we're semi-evolved primates.
And we are an eye
blink if you look
at the history of evolution.
I mean, 10 seconds
ago, we were all
in the slime as
single-celled creatures.
We're not at the
position where we
can stand up and start
making generalized statements
about anything.
We can simply get
on with the day,
and try to treat people in a
way we'd want to be treated.
If we could manage to do
that, we would already
be doing something.
So all I'm saying is, hey,
let's have a little humility
and step back.
And that is not borne of some
great philosophical insight,
it's just realizing what an
asshole I was as a young father
compared to being a fairly
decent grandfather who actually
is almost ready
for fatherhood now.
I'm just about ready
to have my first child.
And that's because
my grandchildren
have finished a
process of learning
that no book, no belief, no
religion, no making the cross,
no nothing could
have supplemented.
That's all I'm saying.
I'm just saying it's
a learning curve.
AUDIENCE: So earlier
you were trying
to make a contrast between
I'm not an agnostic,
I'm an atheist who
believes in God.
But I mean, everything you
just said, to me, sounds,
to me, like what an
agnostic would say.
Saying, crossing yourself
certainly couldn't hurt,
and that all these, wouldn't
it be great for there to-- it
sounds, I'm having a
hard time seeing the--
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Let
me put it this way.
I won't go too much
further with this,
because I can't do better
than what I said in the book.
Which is stated
better, because you
have time to think about it.
I'm just off the cuff here.
But I live in a
world of agnosticism,
but I behave like a believer.
That's the best I could put it.
I try to follow Jesus in terms
of treating people the way
I want to be treated.
It's why I don't slap
my grandchildren,
whether I lose patience or not.
It's a philosophy of
life that says, look,
you've got to choose some path.
This is the path I choose.
But it has nothing
to do with saying,
oh, here's the
theological implication,
and I'm sure this is true
because so forth and so on.
And so it's just admitting that
our beliefs and how we live
are separate things.
But the most important thing
is who we are, not what we say.
That's what I'm
trying to get to.
AUDIENCE: OK, thank
you very much.
FRANK SCHAEFFER:
You're very welcome.
Thank you for your question.
Yeah?
AUDIENCE: I just want to
know, do you see yourself
as trying to convince people
of your more moderate view,
or is it a total, do what
you want, hands off--
FRANK SCHAEFFER: No, I
am trying to convince
people of a more moderate view.
Because I think we
live in a world today--
and this doesn't take much
thinking about-- we're
involved in a medieval holy
war with ISIS and the Taliban,
and these other people.
We had a President in
George W. Bush who basically
ran this country into
the ground on the basis
of evangelical certainty
about invading people
because they hit us first.
We've got a history of
involvement globally, which
is going to really keep
hurting us for centuries.
We live in a polarized world in
which smartass new atheists are
answered by greedy and
hypocritical believers
on the other hand, as if
it's a war between nations
rather than saying in humility,
none of us know anything.
And again, to get very personal,
my interests, my bet in this,
my dog in this fight,
is not my point of view,
it's my grandchildren.
I don't want Lucy and
Jack to be given a series
of false, stupid alternatives.
I would like them to
grow up in a world
where there's more
people who basically look
at the process of being a human
being from a point of view
of not just some humility, but
also compassion and empathy.
And I think art
contributes to that.
Religion can, and often doesn't.
Philosophy can,
and often doesn't.
Education can, usually
doesn't these days.
Because it's all about
teach to the test,
instead of teach to the soul.
So the humanities
go out the window.
And I don't say this just
because I'm at Google.
Remember, I wrote
this book before I
got invited to speak here.
I didn't just put
this page in for you.
But I do believe that
actually one of the hopeful
things in breaking that barrier
down is what Google does.
Not only do I use Google
day and night as a writer,
and a resource for
everything-- it's
the only decent spell-check
system in the world,
by the way.
And I say that as a dyslexic.
My Word spell-check
never finds anything,
let alone anything else.
But you go to
Google, if you even
have a vague idea
of what it might
be like, you will get there.
So it works.
Well, this actually
changes everything
when it comes from the point
of view of a combative approach
to everything.
How can you have certainty
when all knowledge becomes
at your fingertips?
You simply have to
have the humility
to look into what you're
doing and realize, no matter
what I spend my
whole life studying,
I will only scratch
the tip of the iceberg.
So yeah, there was
the Harvard Library
and places you could go and
get a visual idea of everything
that was out there.
But now, someone like
me who's not a scholar
can type in something like the
word Saint John Chrysostom,
and now I could just spend
the rest of my life on that.
That's a very
humbling experience,
and it should
teach us something.
So I'm hoping that my book is a
little tiny drop in the ocean,
that "Why I'm an Atheist
Who Believes in God"
is just simply a statement
that says, listen,
I haven't learned much.
I've learned to be a bit
of a kinder grandfather
than I was a father.
Maybe a bit of a better writer.
But let's all step back
from this war of religion
we're involved with, whether
from the new atheist's
side, or the Christian
side, of the Jewish side,
or the Taliban,
or whoever it is.
Do we really want to
go down this path?
And so to me, I do want to
convince people of that.
I have an agenda.
But it isn't an
in-or-out agenda.
It's an agenda that says,
let's all step back a minute
and take some of the foolish
aggression out of this.
AUDIENCE: How do you do that?
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Well,
it's very difficult.
People ask me about
my blogging, which
I compare to cage fighting
compared to actual writing.
And say, why are you
sometimes so strong in that
when you're preaching
this other viewpoint?
But I think we talk it, and
above all, we say it to people,
as we are right here
in this discussion.
But then, the most
important thing of all
is how we actually
relate with people.
Do we really put climbing
ahead in our career ahead
of human relationships?
Do we really think the
most important thing
to do is earn money?
Do we really want to always try
to dominate the situation we're
in, and succeed in the terms
that corporate America has
lined up for us?
Or do we want to succeed
first as a human being?
And that's really a
series of small choices.
It's not like a big one-time,
born-again experience.
It's the little choices of
where we spend our time,
and who we spend it with.
And family, and
relationships between people,
and all the rest of it.
So I don't think there's
one big fix to this.
I think it's a series of
small choices and priorities
in our lives, and that
changes the way we actually
relate to other human beings.
Yes?
AUDIENCE: Hey, I'm Chris.
Nice to meet you.
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Hi, Chris.
Thank you for coming today.
AUDIENCE: I want to say first,
I appreciate your admitting so
openly that you weren't
good at fatherhood.
Because I'm now a father of two
little kids, and I suck at it.
And I was going to
say, hearing what you
said made me feel less shitty.
It doesn't, actually,
that's not honest.
It does at least making not
feel both shitty and alone,
so I appreciate that.
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Good.
Thank you.
AUDIENCE: I wanted to
ask you, having formerly
been an atheist, now
being a church goer,
I find it interesting
you've had a lot
of up close view of church
behavior that was not hopeful.
It was not positive.
And now, you have spent
a while in a church
where you are clearly
getting positive value,
or no one's holding
a gun to your head
and making you go to the
Greek Orthodox church-- I
guess it's good there.
Beyond the point I
heard loud and clear
from you of avoiding
total certainty,
and the aggressive
asshole behavior that
proceeds from that, do you
have any other suggestions
about how to avoid doing
church badly for those who
are interested in doing church?
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Well, yeah, in
the sense that you first of all
have to, I think, be honest with
ourselves of why we're going.
If we're expecting a magic pill
that will solve everything,
it will always be disappointing.
If we expect perfection,
not just in churches,
but in any relationships
with other human beings.
In a church context,
pretty soon it
boils down to a congregation
of one, and that's me, or you.
Because no one else
is good enough.
And if you know
yourself, you don't
want to be stuck in
any denomination where
you're the pastor, bishop,
and confessor, and all
the rest of it.
So I think part of
it is always being
willing to settle
not just in church
but in any human community
for something workable
where you can have a
meaningful relationship
with other human beings-- I
keep coming back to this--
and not look for the kind of
magic bullet teaching pill.
Actually, I have a
little bit in the book,
and I promise everybody this
is not a planted question.
But I'll just read
one little section,
because as we're getting
pretty down in the time here,
we have a few minutes.
But this is an actual
answer to your question.
In the movie "The Big
Lebowski," The Dude Lebowski,
a single unemployed
slacker living in Venice,
California is mistaken
for a millionaire
who is also named Lebowski.
Thugs break into
The Dude's apartment
and try to coerce
him into paying
a debt he knows nothing about.
When he refuses, they
pee on his carpet.
Later, while considering
the immorality
of the self-defined
nihilists who
desecrated The Dude's
carpet, his friend Walter
says, "Nihilists?
Fuck me, I mean,
say what you want
about the tenets of
national socialism,
Dude, at least it's an ethos."
Unlike the nihilist
carpet wreckers,
Walter, played by John
Goodman, and The Dude,
played by Jeff Bridges,
do have an ethos.
They embrace this
code by bowling.
To them, bowling is church.
Their means of
establishing relationships
with people who share
their commitment
to a liturgical tradition in a
way that caters to their lives.
And their church isn't perfect,
either, but they still go.
Even though it also includes
jerks like Jesus Quintana,
played by Don Turturro.
Turturro's hilarious Jesus
is a pain in the ass.
Notwithstanding, Walter and The
Dude still go bowling with him.
They don't see themselves as too
good for whoever else shows up
to participate.
The Dude is into
liturgical tradition.
He practices his
rituals religiously.
Which include smoking
marijuana in the bath,
drinking White Russians,
bowling, and remaining
faithful to his friends.
The Dude abides, because
he's true to his rights,
and thus to himself.
The Dude does not worry
about his motivations,
let alone his inner
sincerity, or the perfection
of his bowling church.
The Dude is not trying to
change his liturgical rights
to make them hipper,
progressive, or modern.
The Dude isn't a bowler
because he believes in bowling,
but because he bowls.
And that's how I see the
doing of community and faith.
So yeah, there's a line.
The Greek Orthodox
church is no picnic.
I mean, there's
politics everywhere.
Some priest you love, other
people want to kick him out.
On and on it goes,
this is a human deal.
But that said, I like the
continuity of a liturgy
that I subscribe to
and am familiar with,
because I don't want
new all the time.
I want to go back
to familiar things.
So it's like the
same reason you don't
want to go to a home you grew
up in and find they razed it
and put a parking lot there.
It wasn't the greatest place on
Earth, but it was your house,
and you knew it.
So similarly, I like tradition.
So I would just say everybody
has their limit of what
they can take.
But unless that
limit is reached,
the continuity of
friendships, the continuity
of liturgical service, the
continuity of styles that you
are used to is worth
a lot in a world
where so much else is changing.
And it isn't just
church, it's art.
One of my definitions
of great art
is that you want to revisit it.
So if you love a piece
of work, one of the signs
that it is a great
piece of work,
at least as it relates to
you, is you want to go back.
If you're just wowed by
something, the latest CGI
thing on IMAX, and it's
huge and it's loud,
but you never actually want
to revisit that moment,
that says something to you.
It wasn't part of
that inner fabric
that really matters to us.
So those quiet things that
we like to revisit and really
contemplate and enjoy, and
be part of, and community,
and people, to me,
that's worth putting up
with a lot of failure
that doesn't measure up
to the perfection, as
long as that steady stream
of experience feeds us.
So that's the best I can do.
AUDIENCE: Thank you.
FRANK SCHAEFFER: You're welcome.
Yes?
AUDIENCE: Hi.
Patrick.
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Hi, Patrick.
AUDIENCE: The way you
described your daily habits,
it would be really
easy for the religious
to claim you as
their own and say,
he is a believer who has
doubts, like so many of us have.
What's the flip side of
that, where the atheist can
claim you, and say, yeah, he
still has these tendencies
to fall back on faith?
FRANK SCHAEFFER: Well,
I'll mention two things.
One that's not in your question,
but just to put it in context.
As someone who goes
around the country
talking about gay
rights, and accepting
gay marriage, and
transgender rights,
and appears on "Rachel
Maddow" deconstructing
the religious right again,
and again, and again,
the kind of Ghostbusters
thing-- who do you call?
Somebody just said
something stupid,
so we'll get Frank Schaeffer
to tell us just how dumb.
So I have a thing in
the book that says,
and I'm coming back
to your question.
I get a call from something
like "The Maddow Show,"
and it's like, they just
said this dumb thing.
And my dialogue when I get
on there is, Rachel says,
they just said
this stupid thing.
And then I say, well,
how stupid was it?
And she says, very stupid.
And then she says,
how dangerous is it?
And I say, very dangerous,
and that's my next two minute
commentary.
So I'm not a friend.
In the eyes of religious
people, I'm part of that enemy.
When it comes to my
own personal beliefs,
I think that on a much
more serious level,
I'm someone who not only
relates to atheists,
but spends a lot of my
time way past doubt,
and simply being
honest about admitting
that these rituals
fundamentally are not
grounded in anything that would
relate to the word "true."
So for me, the truth,
say, of the Bible,
is that things that
never happened still
can have a nugget
of truth in them,
because it's a reflection of
the collective human experience.
And in the times when I have
more perception of the divine,
I hope that's
somehow been guided.
But most of the time, I wouldn't
break it down in percentages,
I simply don't
believe a word of it.
And that's an honest statement.
I don't think it happened.
And I don't think there's
any way to make it so.
So when it comes to
an argument, a lot
of my beef with the
new atheist movement
is style, and hubris,
and arrogance,
and putting down
long traditions that
have tremendous value
for many reasons.
And not all new
atheists do that.
But when it fundamentally comes
to the point, when I lie down
and die, what do I
think will happen?
Usually, I'm pretty cold
hearted to myself about it,
and say, guess what?
The lights will just go out.
Other times, I
don't believe that.
But at the times
when I do feel that,
it's way past peripheral
doubt to a system
that I think is otherwise
OK, except for my doubts.
And then the last
step I would just
say is if you are going to have
a faith informed by anything
but that kind of doubt,
then it certainly
doesn't qualify it as a faith.
It qualifies as an addiction
to some sort of certainty,
because faith implies unbelief.
And I leave you
with that thought.
So I think we're done.
Thank you.
Thanks a lot.
Sorry I didn't get
to your question.
Thanks a lot.
