Third Way was the child of a particular time. The evangelical community which conceived and gave birth to it had begun in the Sixties to rediscover the imperative of 'social responsibility' which, with some notable exceptions, it had so long neglected.

In 1977, Tear Fund was nine years old, Greenbelt was three and Care Trust was in embryo as the Nationwide Festival of Light. The process of re-engagement with our culture and society � though today it is still far from complete � was well in hand. Third Way was to be an advocate for that re-engagement, and a forum for the robust and radical biblical thinking that it required.

Its title referred to a comment by Os Guinness in The Dust of Death: 'How often in the contemporary discussion a sensitive modern man knows that he cannot accept either of the polarised alternatives offered to him. In Christianity, however, there can be a Third Way, a true middle ground which has a basis, is never compromise and is far from silent.'

Much has happened since Guinness wrote those words � and not merely the discovery by men that sensitive modern women also think about things. Each day seems to throw up new issues which even a few years ago were unimaginable, from cloning to cyberspace. Generation X had barely taken the stage before Generation Y was creeping into the limelight. And who would have guessed in the late Eighties, let alone 1977, that South Africa and Russia would today be struggling for freedom not from authoritarianism but from crime?

Meanwhile, exciting new opportunities present themselves. In the flux of the New Age and its disillusion with scientific materialism, our society seems more willing to talk about spiritual and moral issues. The idea that God is dead is itself looking very poorly, and sociologists are talking of the 're-enchantment' of society and the rediscovery of the transcendent. One of the most popular topics of debate on the Internet is religion.

The world outside the church seems to be more willing to listen to prophetic voices. In this climate, a magazine that is distinctively biblical, intellectually rigorous, socially responsible and culturally aware has a chance to win a hearing. And if it can call on the best of our Christian thinkers and writers to challenge and inspire both the church and the world, that hearing will be fully deserved.

That is the kind of magazine that Third Way aspires to be.

�