Rating: 
Summary: Dense, yes, but worth the effort!
Review: This book is dense in ideas. Fr. Polkinghorne does not talk down to you, he expects you to keep up. I must admit, that even with an MSEE, I had to read some passages three or four times before I felt that I had grasped the nuances. However, it is well worth the effort (assuming you have your OED on hand as well as your old physics and philosophy texts!). I would say that fred101 did a better job than any other reviewer to date in summarizing the key elements of this book, but I will attempt to condense it further and make it more readable -- even if it may only be for my own edification!
Fr. Polkinghorne makes clear that he knows that he cannot claim to make a "proof" of God's existence nor can he likewise claim that science (that is to say the human endeavor to "explain" and thereby predict/retrodict commonly observed phenomena -- my apologies to Huston Smith, but there is my attempt) can completely approach an all encompassing explanation of reality. Modern philosophy as well as modern physics itself (through QM's indeterminancy) and the Incompleteness Theorem of Godel have seen to that. Those who seriously study these subjects will appreciate this. What he can say, however, is this, that science has approached a certain practical level of explanation that cannot be ignored any longer by those of more mystic beliefs or philosophies. Likewise, he argues that at least the belief in a God of the new natural philosophy as he outlines here (and in his other books) would be as (if not more) "intellectually satisfying" in placing a context to the cosmos as we understand it currently than a universe born out of nothing! He adds to this that it is to his thinking nothing short of spectacular to heap upon this a belief, as non-intelligent design'ers must, in the coincidences of the apparently narrow path which not only brought us into existence, but which also makes the universe appear to fight our general understandings of entropy (chaos) by "becoming" something more "complex" and even "self aware" (through our minds) rather than just remaining within its equally likely state of the original primordial chaos of the big bang. Perhaps, only David Bohm or Fritjof Capra have offered something plausible here, but they are not in the mainstream of interpretations of QM. Fr. Polkinghorne relies on the former to explain this God's possible method of interaction with our reality through its complex (edge of order and chaos) systems. This could be considered a weak link by many, but there it is. I admit that I am slightly inclined to it myself, as far as it may be taken.
If there are any other weak points to Fr. Polkinghorne's thinking, they would start with the connection he attempts to make between this neo-natural theology and the orthodoxy of Christianity. I honestly didn't understand it. At best I would describe it as a liberal application of "Cartesian Doubt" -- If you don't know/have any better facts, it's best to stick with what's most commonly believed. But by that logic then we should all perhaps be Buddists or Muslims. Anyway, from other reviews, I am apparently not alone. In his defense, he rightly points out that "critical realism" as applied to theological study is a new field and better theological minds than he have only begun to grope its boundaries -- we therefore must be respectfully patient on this perhaps. Equally unfortunate is the fact that he evades (squarely!) facing the question of the rather spectacular notion that such a Creator, as he just envisioned, should bestow any particularly special character to one (incredibly small!) cultural group and to add perhaps more insult to this, only visit them with an incarnation of Himself -- leaving no first-hand written word. For a design as spectacular and intricate as this universe appears to me, on a planet as small as ours, it would seem to be a blundering oversight to miss all the other diverse cultures -- though, to the mind of a chaotician, nothing could be a sweeter picture, perhaps, than one illiterate man, coming from seeming nowheresville, and exhibiting such a major influence upon the world. In all, this may be one of the most important books you'll ever read, if you understand it! I very highly recommend it.
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