DANCING ALONE: THE QUEST FOR
ORTHODOX FAITH IN THE AGE OF FALSE RELIGIONS

Iniquity abounds in the Western world and there seems to be no consensus on what is right and what is wrong. There is no agreement on how to stop the decline of our society. Underlying this confusion is a passion for selfish individualism falsely called "freedom" which has become a substitute for liberty built upon character and self discipline. Our day is reminiscent of the time of Israel's Judges when people worshipped many gods because there was no king in the land and everyone did "what was right in his own eyes." Frank Schaeffer attributes much of this moral decline to Protestant Christianity in his latest book, DANCINGALONE: THEQUEST FORORTHODOXFAITH IN THEAGE OFFALSE RELIGIONS, 1994 Holy Cross Orthodox Press, Brookline, MA.
Frank is the son of the famous Francis Schaeffer, but has rejected the evangelical, Protestant Christianity of his father. In a scathing indictment of the Protestant Reformation, which he calls the Protestant Rebellion, he attributes the rise of selfish individualism, secularism and humanism to the crowning of individual conscience in matters of faith and practice. The right of every individual to interpret the Word of God for himself, or herself, is a fundamental principle and practice of Protestant philosophy and theology. The results of such a principle, however, are a splintered Protestant Church into over 20,000 sects and denominations, doctrinal squabbles, emotional mishandling of God's truth, heretical excesses, ignorance of Church history, and counterfeit religions. The philosophical underpinnings of Protestant thought make it hard to justify the absolute, unchanging authority of the Scripture to the culture when the final authority is dependent upon personal interpretation. Since the Church gives no single clear witness, (observe the disagreements in the Church over abortion and homosexuality), the people of the world are forced to conclude that there is no universal truth, only relative opinions. Finally, everyone is left to be his own god in matters of religion, truth, and morals.
What is missing, says Schaeffer, is the idea of the corporate authority of the Church where truth is proved through the wisdom of the Body through the ages. Truth does not depend upon one person's interpretation, but upon the Word of

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