People throw away what they could have by insisting on perfection, which they cannot have, and looking for it where they will never find it.

Schaeffer's husband Francis died in 1984 but Edith Schaeffer continued to be associated with the L'Abri organisation which Edith Schaeffer and her husband founded. In 1955 they began L'Abri a community that welcomed people who were seeking intellectually honest and culturally informed answers to questions about God and the meaning of life. It was there that Edith Schaeffer met Francis Schaeffer and they were married in 1935.

Her What is a Family? (1975) compared the extended family to a mobile. In 1955 they began L'Abri a community that welcomed people who were seeking intellectually honest and culturally informed answers to questions about God and the meaning of life. It won a Gold Medallion Award from the Evangelical Christian PubliEdith Schaefferrs Association (ECPA) in 1979.