BLUE TWILIGHT: Nature, Creationism, and American Religion

Prolific author Gilkey, "retired" in 1989 from the University of Chicago Divinity School, continues to speak and publish in his area of interest and expertise: American religious life and contemporary theology. His has long been a reasonable voice in cultural arenas where science and religion intersect, so when he speaks, people listen. The trouble is, we've heard all this before—literally. Lectures given over the past 18 years have been sloppily compiled into this volume, with little coherence or thematic unity. Material is repeated and recycled—not only subject matter, but syntax. Chapter six appears to be an abridgment of chapter five, with complete sentences cut and pasted. His take on recent theological figures (Tillich, Niebuhr) and developments (fundamentalism, pluralism, eco-theology) is more survey than sustained argument. And his assessment of the creation-science controversy, while astute, is marred by a simplistic equating of the "religious right" with fundamentalists, and by an alarmist view of their engagement in politics, as he persistently compares them to Nazis and Communists. The book's title refers to a "Blue Twilight"—a "place where light fights with dark in religion and culture." This volume contains a discussion of religion, culture, light and dark, and there may even be a good book somewhere in view, but in the twilight, one can't quite make it out. (July)