The Great Mystery: Science, God and the Human Quest for Meaning
Digital Logos Edition
Overview
There is currently huge interest in the question of human nature and identity, and what the human future might look like. Who are we? Why are we here? What is our future? Are we alone? And what can religion bring, alongside biology and anthropology, to these important and exciting questions? The Great Mystery focuses on this fascinating field of study. Alister McGrath, bestselling author and Andreas Idreos Professor of Science and Religion at Oxford University, explores the question of human nature from both scientific and religious perspectives, and weaves together the results to open up and explore some of the deepest and most important questions about who we are, why we matter, and what our future might be. A follow-up to his critically acclaimed Inventing the Universe, in The Great Mystery Alister McGrath once again brings together science with religion to yield an enriched vision of reality, along with rigorous and thoroughly up-to-date scholarship and intellectual accessibility.
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- Explores the question of human nature from both scientific and religious perspectives.
- Explores questions about who we are, why we matter, and what our future might be.
- Brings together science with religion to yield an enriched vision of reality.
- Chapter 1 Born To Wonder: Asking Questions; Hoping for Answers
- Chapter 2 Who Are We? Wondering about Human Nature
- Chapter 3 Human Identity: Mapping the Landscape
- Chapter 4 Pilgrims Seeking a ‘Big Picture’: The Balcony and the Road
- Chapter 5 Searching for Meaning: Why We Need More Than Just Facts
- Chapter 6 Meaning: Discovery or Invention?
- Chapter 7 When Meaning Fails: Doubt, Trauma, and Disbelief
- Chapter 8 Wondering about Nature: The Imaginative Roots of Science
- Chapter 9 At Home in the Universe? Wondering about Our Place in the Cosmos
- Chapter 10 What’s Wrong with Us? Why We Need the Idea of Sin
- Chapter 11 Humanisms: Secular and Religious
- Chapter 12 The Myth of Progress: Reshaping Humanity
- Chapter 13 Endings: Some Brief Musings
Alister McGrath in The Great Mystery asks the questions (with his usual rigour and clarity) that philosophers tend to avoid these days: ‘What is the point of life?’ and ‘What is wrong with us?’ He, too, is concerned to explore the meaning that lies behind the facts in a world drowning in information from the sciences, calling for a fundamental rethinking of who we are.
―Church Times
This is a book characterised by a deep sense of humility before the mystery of life and the limitations of human knowledge. It is also one that is generously open to the views of those with whom he disagrees. At the same time he shows, often with a telling example, how Christianity not only gives us a glimpse of the bigger picture, but offers a framework of meaning enabling us to cope with our journey from birth to death. Whilst Drawing on his vast learning in both science and philosophy Alister McGrath still manages to convey his argument with great clarity and accessibility. It is a book that will challenge all dogmatists, whether scientific or religious, and which will greatly encourage those who are tentative and searching.
―Lord Harries of Pentregarth
The book comes alive in the third and final part that deals with the future and humanity’s struggle with the conflict of good and evil in its nature... a worthwhile book.
―Methodist Recorder
- Title: The Great Mystery: Science, God and the Human Quest for Meaning
- Author: Alister McGrath
- Publisher: Hodder and Stoughton
- Print Publication Date: 2018
- Pages: 256
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Reader Edition
- ISBNs: 9781473634343, 9781473634336, 1473634342, 1473634334
- Resource ID: LLS:GREATMYSTERY
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2024-09-26T15:52:01Z
Alister McGrath (Ph.D.) is a scholar and writer who is presently Andreas Idreos Professor of Science and Religion at Oxford University. After his initial studies in natural science at Oxford, taking a doctorate in molecular biophysics under the supervision of Prof Sir George Radda, McGrath moved into the field of Christian theology. He was Oxford’s Professor of Historical Theology from 1999 to 2008. He then moved to King’s College London as Professor of Theology, Ministry, and Education, before returning to Oxford as Idreos Professor in 2014. He also served as Gresham Professor of Divinity, a position established in 1597, from 2015-18. He retired in September 2022.
He is best known for his definitive and widely used textbooks on Christian theology and his authoritative biography of C. S. Lewis. As a former atheist, McGrath is fascinated by the interaction of faith, science, and atheism, and writes regularly on these themes. McGrath was born in Belfast in 1953, and holds both Irish and British citizenship. He lives in the Cotswolds near Oxford.
For McGrath’s website, including details of his weekly Youtube postings and videos helping you use his theology textbooks, go to alistermcgrath.net