Alister McGrath

Alister McGrath (1953- ) was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland. In college he majored in mathematics, physics, and chemistry. In 1971 he entered Oxford on scholarship to study chemistry. By 1975 he had earned first class honors in chemistry and began research in molecular biophysics in Oxford's Department of Biochemistry.

For three years, he carried out scientific research, leading to the publication of a number of peer-reviewed research articles, while also studying for the Oxford's school of theology. He was awarded a fellowship in 1976 to study lipid transfer at the State University of Utrecht.

In 1977 McGrath was awarded an Oxford D.Phil. for his research in the natural sciences and the following year gained first class honors in the school of theology. The interaction of Christian theology and the natural sciences has subsequently been a major theme of his research work, as demonstrated in his three volumes on scientific theology (2001-2003).

McGrath left Oxford to study at Cambridge and to serve the Church of England, first as a deacon in 1980, then as a priest, beginning in 1981. In 1983 he returned to Oxford as lecturer in Christian doctrine and ethics. He gave the 1990 Bampton Lectures, exploring the factors which led to the origins of doctrinal statements in Christianity.

McGrath became a research lecturer in theology at Oxford in 1993, and also served as research professor of theology at Regent College, Vancouver, B.C., from 1993-1999. In 1999 he was awarded a personal chair in theology at Oxford. He earned an Doctorate of Divinity at Oxford in 2001 for his research on historical and systematic theology. In 2004 McGrath became the first director of the newly-established Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics. In 2006 he accepted a research fellowship to begin directing a major new research project on natural theology.

As a former atheist, McGrath is respectfully critical of the movement. In recent years, he has been especially interested in the emergence of "scientific atheism," and has researched the distinctive approach to atheist apologetics found in the writings of the Oxford zoologist Richard Dawkins. McGrath regularly engages in debate and dialogue with leading atheists. At present, he is researching the iconic role played by Charles Darwin in atheist apologetics, and the appeal to the controversial concept of the "meme" in recent atheist accounts of the origins of belief in God.

The Apostles' Creed: Its Origin and Its Relevance for Today (DVD)

A Brief History of Heaven

Christianity's Dangerous Idea: The Protestant Revolution--A History from the 16th Century to the Twenty-first (2007)

Christian Spirituality (1999)

Christian Spirituality: An Introduction (1999)

Creation (2004)

The Dawkins Delusion? Atheist Fundamentalism and the Denial of the Divine (with Joanna Collicutt McGrath)

Dawkins' God: Genes, Memes, and the Meaning of Life

Doubting: Growing Through the Uncertainties of Faith (2007)

For All the Saints: Evangelical Theology and Christian Spirituality (with Timothy George) (2003)

The Foundations of Dialogue in Science and Religion (1999)

The Future of Christianity (2002)