Biblical contradiction and horrors, piled onto the ossuary of life's tragic offerings, can be irredeemably paralyzing. This author shows how a "comic vision serves the church and the world". Gives examples. Sketches a theology of culture way beyond the labeled conservatives and liberals. The author does not quite say it, but proves, that those who are dour and sour about Religion are displaying an ignorance of their scriptures and a lack of faith in their dogmatic eschatology--which is a claim of Glad Tidings.

Hammering iron into the irony, Ralph C. Wood brings his devotions to the scripture of Flannery O'Connor, Walker Percy, John Updike and Peter DeVries, while leaning heavily on Karl Barth. (Yes, him of the "Nein!", God as "wholly other".) While claiming not to intend to be exposing the rot of the church, in fact Wood piles fuel on the flames of purgation, with humor and joy that only those of us with an entirely secular and humanist devotion can really appreciate. ( )