From the Publisher

OUR END-OF-THE-YEAR COVERS OVER THE PAST TWO decades have been a fairly eclectic mix of both the sacred (Mother Teresa, the Virgin Mary) and the profane (Big Cars, Bart Simpson). Breaking news provided the selections in between. This year our cover is temporal . . . that is, scientific, but with God undeniably in the details. It is a rigorous examination of how science and religion are intersecting at the end of the century, how the achievements of modern science just might be reinforcing religious faith rather than undermining it. To pull off such a challenging assignment, we chose Robert Wright, a science writer whose column "The Information Age" for The Sciences magazine won the 1986 National Magazine Award for essays and criticism. Wright, now a senior editor at the New Republic, has benign memories of his first experience as a writer for TIME. "The editors were astonishingly tolerant of my stylistic idiosyncrasies," he says. "I had assumed I would be brutalized, but I wasn't." While calling himself "a fairly hard-core scientific materialist," Wright adds, "but I do like to think there is more to this universe than meets the eye." In somewhat the same vein, one admiring critic has described him as "a science writer fighting off a nasty case of existential dread."

Our intent, of course, is not to define Wright's beliefs but to help readers understand the evolving relationship between the spiritual and empirical worlds. To help that process, associate editor Richard N. Ostling has written a piece accompanying the main story that tells of working scientists of various faiths who are perfectly willing to affirm their belief in God the Creator.

At the end of each year since 1927, we at TIME have named the Man of the Year, that person who, for better or worse, has had the most impact on the year's events. For an advance (and very inside) briefing on the 1992 choice, tune to CNN on Saturday, Dec. 26, at 9 p.m. EST. "It is our mission," says CNN executive producer Stacy Jolna, "to keep TIME's secret safe and to translate the Man of the Year cover story into a compelling television production." Working with Jolna was a special "SWAT team" of half a dozen secret operatives who spent the past three weeks culling the best sound and pictures from thousands of hours of videotape to put together this year's show. Viewers will learn not only the identity of the 1992 Man of the Year but also how he (or she) was selected and who the runners-up were.