FRANKYnstein Shaeffer

Franky Schaeffer, frankly speaking, has lost it!

See his weird confessional considering the murder of Mad Doktor Tiller at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/frank-schaeffer/how-i-and-other-pro-life_b_209747.html, which begins: "My late father and I share the blame (with many others) for the murder of Dr. George Tiller the abortion doctor gunned down on Sunday. Until I got out of the religious right (in the mid-1980s) and repented of my former hate-filled rhetoric I was both a leader of the so-called pro-life movement and a part of a Republican Party hate machine masquerading as the moral conscience of America."

I discovered this outrageous article through the blog (http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2009/06/frank-schaeffer-son-of-evangelical-icon.html) of an outspoken Roman Catholic apologist, Dave Armstrong, who writes: "Last September, Schaeffer put out his book, 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, in which he essentially renounced his past and trashed his father and mother. It was one of the most astonishing displays of ungratefulness and betrayal of one's parents (and the movements one was a part of) in memory. He had done a similar thing to a lesser extent in his semi-autobiographical novel Portofino (2004). His mother Edith has expressed extreme anguish and hurt over this, and longtime Schaeffer family friends are outraged by how Frank has behaved. See, for example, family friend Os Guinness' scathing review of this book and a further comment by Dr. Jim Eckman."

I recommend the Os Guiness review, found at http://www.christianitytoday.com/bc/2008/marapr/1.32.html?start=1. The review begins with the following thought: "The case can be made, however, that from a Christian perspective, no relationship is more mysterious and more wonderful, yet sometimes more troubling, than that of fathers and sons. The depth and wonder begin with all we know of the relationship of God the Father and God the Son, while the troubled aspects stem from the Fall. Consider Absalom's rebellion against King David in the Old Testament, Edmund Gosse's exposure of his father Philip, the Oedipal drive in the writings of Sigmund Freud—and now Frank Schaeffer's Crazy for God, a memoir that is his personal apologia at the expense of his famous father, Francis Schaeffer, who was the founder and leader of the worldwide network of L'Abri communities."

Reading the review, as well as Armstrong's comments about Schaeffer, I found myself reflecting on my own status as son of a well-regarded man of God. To be candid, I must confess that I saw a bit of myself when reading about Franky's angry rhetorical attitude; I hope and pray that I truly learn to "speak the truth in love" so that my own words are not merely sounding brass and clanging noise. In his anger, it seems the Franky Schaeffer has finally gone too far and sinned - supporting such a monstrous agenda as belongs to the wickedly deceitful "pro-choice" crowd.