World Without End: Essays on Apocalypse and After

Climate change, religious faith, endangered species, ideas of renewal, resurrection, and evolution collide and intertwine in this debut collection of essays focused on the American South. Park, the child of a United Methodist minister, uses memoir and her own questions regarding her relationship to faith and science as a springboard into an exploration of what it means for people of different faiths and worldviews to contemplate the impact of climate change, how to reconcile religion and science, and how pregnancy and motherhood connect to themes of resurrection and environmental renewal. Traveling across the South, Park examines subjects such as protecting endangered species, ecologically friendly burial, evangelical pilgrimage sites including a Noah’s Ark–themed tourist attraction in Kentucky, seeking to understand and illuminate the way evangelical and fundamentalist Christians understand and react to the natural world. Park deftly weaves journalism, philosophical and theological writings, and personal experience into a keenly observed discussion of the modern experience of the American South that never veers into stereotype or finger-pointing. Several of the essays were originally published elsewhere.