Across the world 'faith' and 'believing' have fallen on hard times. Their traditional modes of expression struggle for recognition. While many acknowledge they cannot live without faith, it is not easy to return to its traditional sources. What is to be done? Lyons traces the decline of faith forms, religious and secular, from the time of the European Enlightenment to the secular aspects of Australian colonisation, to understand why contemporary society is such a sough environment for faith. He concurs with Michael J. Buckley that Christianity's failure to reinforce its own foundations, rather than the explosion of scientific knowledge, has opened the way to indifference to faith. He draws on Martin Buber and Emmanuel Levinas to grasp the inner structure of biblical faith. Into focus come the unique quality of interpersonal encounters (and the way from 'thou' to 'Thou'), and the absoluteness of our responsibility for the other. Truth discovered in intersubjectivity, rather than objectivity, turns out to be the bedrock of faith. Lyons goes on to argue that the gospels, especially the Synoptics, are primarily a universal handbook on faith - rather than a manual for church life. Faith comes to be understood as life lived in dialogue. Face-to-face encounters place one in relationship with the divine, while our unfolding biographies may take on a revelatory quality. Lyons argues that faith grounded in face-to-face encounters, and faithful to their dynamics, is the kind most likely to survive and thrive.