Martin Marty reviews Krista Tippett's new book, Speaking of Faith

The University of Chicago Martin Marty Center: "I seethe and sulk when I find the media giving space and time to the Ann Coulters on the nut-right, and a good deal of space and time to those whom reviewer Brad Robideau refers to as the battle criers of 'the end of faith' and 'the God delusion.' Meanwhile, Tippett, and others like her, while by no means out of view, still do not generate the audiences and responses that the noisy extremists do. So I seethe and sulk a bit when those who complain that they are alienated by the extremes in religions often do not bother with Tippett and her kind.

Tippett has interviewed a large and diverse cast of characters, and draws on that experience in her book, which is, in some sense, like a first draft of a memoir -- she's too young to be taking a long look back. The book offers a concise look at her Southern Baptist childhood, a temporary drift from faith, political correspondence years, learning at Yale Divinity School, and the invention of her NPR program. The result is not an egocentric program or book, but a set of testimonies filtered through her experience. Tippett neither hides her own faith nor parades it, but uses it as a base for drawing out the personal experiences of her interviewees and quotees."