Alister McGrath

Alister McGrath (b. 1953, Belfast) is an Anglican theologian and historian of ideas who holds doctorates from Oxford in both molecular biophysics and theology. A former atheist, he turned to Christianity as an undergraduate and went on to become Andreas Idreos Professor of Science and Religion at Oxford (2014–2022). His major systematic project, the three-volume Scientific Theology (2001–2003), seeks to ground Christian doctrine in a critical-realist engagement with the natural sciences, drawing on Thomas F. Torrance and figures such as Roy Bhaskar. Earlier work in historical theology, including studies of Reformation thought and the doctrine of justification (Iustitia Dei), established his reputation as an intellectual historian. McGrath became publicly prominent through sustained critiques of Richard Dawkins in Dawkins' God (2004) and The Dawkins Delusion? (2007, with Joanna Collicutt McGrath), and through The Twilight of Atheism (2004), which provoked debate over its narrative of declining unbelief. Critics, including Dawkins himself and various secular philosophers, have charged him with mischaracterizing scientific naturalism and underestimating evidential challenges to theism; some theologians question whether his 'scientific theology' delivers more than analogical rhetoric. Nonetheless his work remains a major reference point in Anglophone science-and-religion dialogue, natural theology, and contemporary apologetics.