Includes bibliographical references and index.

Introduction: Crisis and Reconstruction -- 1. Spiritual Personality: Walter G. Muelder, L. Harold DeWolf, S. Paul Schilling, Nels F. S. Ferre, and the Theology of Personalist Idealism -- Theorizing Personalist Idealism: Bowne, Knudson, and Brightman -- Inheriting the Personalist Tradition -- Socializing Personality: Walter Muelder -- DeWolf and the Gospel Center -- Gospel Liberalism, Neo-orthodoxy, and Religious Naturalism -- S. Paul Schilling and the Problem of Theistic Belief -- Sustaining the Personalist Faith -- Nels F. S. Ferre and the Spirit of Divine Love -- The Universal Word and Spirit -- Ferre and the Personalist Tradition -- 2. The New Metaphysics and the Divine Relativity: Charles Hartshorne, Bernard M. Loomer, Daniel Day Williams, Bernard E. Meland, and the Religion of Creative Process -- The Early Chicago School: Foster, Mathews, Case, Ames, and Smith -- The New Metaphysics: Alfred North Whitehead and Henry Nelson Wieman -- Creating Dipolar Theism: Charles Hartshorne and Bernard M. Loomer -- Hartshorne and the Logic of Dipolar Theism -- Creating Process Theology: Loomer and Daniel Day Williams -- Mystical Naturalism and the New Metaphysics: Bernard E. Meland -- Constructive Theology and Spiritual Culture -- Liberal Theology, Culture, and the Realities of Faith -- Jamesian Flux, Whiteheadian Structure: Method, Concepts, and Process Theology -- The Problem of God and the Legacy of Chicago Theology -- 3. Visions of Liberation: James Luther Adams, Martin Luther King Jr., J. Deotis Roberts, Valerie Saiving, Rosemary Radford Ruether, and the Rhetoric of Emancipation -- James Luther Adams and Unitarian Christianity -- Martin Luther King Jr. and the Sacredness of Personality -- The Civil Rights Movement and the Religion of Personality -- Claiming King for Personalist Idealism -- J. Deotis Roberts, Reconciliation, Liberation, and Africentrism -- Feminist Critique: Valerie Saiving and Women's Experience -- Feminist Liberation Theology: Rosemary Radford Ruether -- 4. In the Spirit of Whitehead: W. Norman Pittenger, John B. Cobb Jr., David Ray Griffin, Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki, and Process Theology -- W. Norman Pittenger, Liberal Catholicism, and the Incarnate Word -- The God of Process and the Process Movement -- Finding a Religious Worldview: John B. Cobb Jr. -- The Death of God and the Promise of Whiteheadian Theology -- Building and Transforming the Process Movement -- Secularism, Relativism, and the Idea of Christ -- Christology, Theodicy, and Divine Power: David Ray Griffin -- Panexperientialism: Unsnarling the World-Knot of Spirit and Nature -- Theistic Reenchantment and Commonsense Universalism -- Marjorie Suchocki and Feminist Process Theology -- Ecotheology: Sustainability, Justice, and the Liberation of Life -- 5. Theology and Modern Doubt: Langdon Gilkey, Schubert M. Ogden, James M. Gustafson, Gordon D. Kaufman, and the Divine Creativity -- Beyond Neo-Orthodoxy: Langdon Gilkey -- Naming and Reaping the Whirlwind -- Schubert Ogden, James Gustafson, and Christian Theocentrism -- Myth, Demythologizing, Faith, and Existence -- Ethics from a Theocentric Perspective -- Relativism, Knowledge, and the Divine Mystery: Gordon Kaufman -- Constructing the Divine Mystery -- 6. Models and Symbols of the Divine: Peter C. Hodgson, Edward Farley, Sallie McFague, Robert Cummings Neville, and Theological Reconstruction -- Peter C. Hodgson and the Theology of Freedom -- Edward Farley and Ecclesial Reflection -- Fragmented Theology and Empathic Divinity -- Hegelian Spirit and the Divine Shapes of Freedom -- Metaphors of the Divine Body: Sallie McFague -- Sacramental Remythologizing and the Flourishing of Life -- Divine Creating: Robert Cummings Neville -- Axiology, Truth, Religious Symbols, and Fourfold Dimensions -- 7. Liberalism and the Catholic Imagination: Gregory Baum, Richard P. McBrien, David Tracy, Anne E. Carr, Elizabeth A. Johnson, and the Bounds of Revision -- Defining a Post-Vatican II Mainstream: Gregory Baum and Richard P. McBrien -- The Blondelian Shift and the Divine Universality -- David Tracy and the Analogical Imagination -- Postmodernity, Interreligious Theology, and Mystical Prophecy -- Feminist Interruptions: Anne Carr and Elizabeth Johnson -- Sheer Liveliness: Renaming the Trinitarian Mystery -- The Catholic Imagination, New and Old -- 8. Rethinking the Traditions: Thandeka, Forrest Church, Rufus Burrow Jr., Nancy Frankenberry, Jerome A. Stone, William Dean, Sheila Greeve Davaney, Roger Haight, Ian G. Barbour, Catherine Keller, and Postmodernity -- Schleiermacher and the Embodied Self: Thandeka -- Recovering Transcendentalist Universalism: Forrest Church -- Renewing the Personalist Idea: Rufus Burrow Jr. -- Radical Empiricism and Religious Naturalism: Nancy Frankenberry and Jerome A. Stone -- The New Historicism: William Dean -- Feminist Pragmatic Historicism: Sheila Davaney -- Symbol and Spirit: Roger Haight -- Rethinking the Science-Religion Relation: Ian Barbour -- Feminist Becoming: Catherine Keller -- 9. A Hidden Renaissance: The Irony of Liberal Crisis -- The Double Bind and Other Problems -- Beyond the Academy: Best-selling Liberal Theology -- Theology beyond Liberalism? The Postliberal Challenge -- Liberal Necessity and Gospel Spirit.

"In this concluding volume of his three-volume, comprehensive, landmark history, Gary Dorrien mixes theological and philosophical analyses with historical and biographical detail in interpreting the liberal era of American theology. Here he argues that although liberal theology has been in crisis for the past half-century, it has also experienced a "hidden renaissance" of intellectual creativity. Liberal theology in the early twenty-first century is more diverse, complex, and marginalized than ever before in its history, but its essential idea-creating a progressive, credible, integrative third way between orthodox over-belief and secular unbelief-remains as necessary as ever. Book jacket."--BOOK JACKET.