NOTE: William Romanowski's best selling and award winning book, Eyes Wide Open, has been re-released in a new revised and expanded edition. This book has been a CPYU favorite for a long time and the new edition is even better than the first. The following review was of the original release. The new cover can be seen on the right.

As Christians, what should we do with popular culture? In his refreshing, challenging and practical book Eyes Wide Open: Looking For God In Popular Culture (Brazos Press, 2001, ISBN 1-58743-009-6), William D. Romanowski calls followers of Christ to avoid the mistake of responding to popular culture with approaches of total immersion or total isolation. Instead, he lays out a strategy for an "engaged, critical and productive involvement with the popular arts" that is "grounded in a faith vision that encompasses all of life and culture." The result is an approach that is faithful to the Scriptures and mirrors the mind and will of Christ.

Eyes Wide Open will challenge readers to consider how they are influenced by culture, how they can critically engage culture, and how they can use popular culture to influence others to seek and find real answers to their deep spiritual longings. If you're a maker or consumer of art/music that's labeled as "Christian," you must consider Romanowski's call to reconsider our standards for what makes art/music "good" and "Christian." Youth workers, parents and pastors will find the appendix--which includes numerous questions that form an analytical matrix--a valuable tool for teaching our kids to engage their culture Christianly.

Eyes Wide Open is one of the best books I've found on Christianity and pop culture. It's sure to shed much-needed Biblical light on how to deal with the "problems, tensions, frustrations that Christians have encountered in their engagement with the popular arts" while suggesting " a way forward."

- Walt Mueller