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Crazy for God: How I Grew Up as One of the Elect, Helped Found the Religious Right, and Lived to Take All (or Almost All) of It Back by Frank Schaeffer
Schaeffer does not mince words, making his narrative honest, inflammatory and at times quite funny; despite its excess length and some confusing chronological leaps, this story of faith, fame and family in modern America is a worthy read. All rights reserved.
"Memoir obviously demands introspection, and Schaeffer doesn't hold back...Schaeffer describes a life that was by turns happy, difficult, idyllic, and completely nuts...He's a world-class storyteller...He can make us laugh, make us wince, and make us really think about things, all at the same time." -- Christianity Today's Books & Culture
Crazy for God isn't just another James Frey-style memoir of personal dysfunction...It's an alternately hilarious and excruciating look at Schaeffer's life with his Christian missionary parents and after he left their orbit. -- Boston Globe
A brilliant book, a portrait of fundamentalism painted in broad strokes with streaks of nuance, the twinned coming-of-age story of Frank and the Christian right. It has parallels in secular culture and is an honest read about family life and its challenges. Suitable and recommended for large libraries. -- Library Journal
. His disillusionment, when it came, hit hard; while he would eventually achieve modest fame as a filmmaker and author (of novels and nonfiction), the initial stages of Schaeffer's post-religious life were anything but glamorous; a particularly moving passage describes Schaeffer shoplifting pork chops rather than return to the evangelical fold. Raised in Switzerland in the utopian community and spiritual school his evangelical parents founded, Schaeffer was restless and aware even at a young age that "my life was being defined by my parent's choices." Still, he took to "the family business" well, following his dad as he became one of the "best-known evangelical leaders in the U.S." on whirlwind speaking tours. While rubbing shoulders with such empire builders as Pat Robertson, James Dobson and Jerry Falwell, Schaeffer witnessed the birth of the Christian anti-abortion movement, and became an evangelical writer, speaker and star in his own right. But this story moves in more than one direction: both coming-of-age narratives are pulled against the current by the tragedy of Francis Schaeffer, a man who let his children, biological and ideological, guide him down a path from which he'd spent his whole life struggling to get off." -- Jeff Sharlet, New Statesman,10/25/07
A story about the dangers of inauthentic faith...An important book...A cautionary tale about the damaging effects on children whose parents have an excess of spiritual pride. -- Washington Times
Interesting glimpses into the burgeoning religious right folded into a deeply personal memoir...Schaeffer is brutally honest...He offers particularly eye-opening accounts of his personal encounters with the likes of Pat Robertson, James Dobson et al...Candid, sometimes angry and clearly cathartic for the author. -- Kirkus Reviews
It offers considerable insight into several issues that have bedeviled American life in the past thirty years, and while it isn't scholarly, when taken in conjunction with his other works...it gives us not only a handle on the mess we are in but also quite a few laughs. -- Jane Smiley, The Nation
Sounding a refreshing variation on the I-was-lost-but-now-I'm-found theme, Schaeffer's apology rings true. -- Booklist, starred review
This is not just a book about rejecting Christian evangelicalism.

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