Cross posted from the Xenodochion

I finished reading Dawkins' God recently and found it very a very well written, engaging peice of philosophy.

Simply put McGrath, a professor of Historical Christianity and holder of a PhD in Molecular Biochemistry engages Dawkins on his own terms. He confronts Dawkin's bald statements about religion and his arguments for the scientific basis of atheism and pulls them apart piece by piece.

McGrath, respectfully, and in the spirit of scholarly debate highlights the inconsistencies of Dawkins' position, it's circularity (Darwinian evolution proves atheism which proves Darwinian evolution), his lack of actual theological or philosohpical knowledge and the relatively irrational polemic language (as opposed to structured scholarly argument) that Dawkins uses.

Dawkins cannot be taken seriously in his arguments for atheism, and, it would seem, many prominent and thoughtful atheists distance themselves from him. Within his field Dawkins is an exemplary thinker and scholar, however, outside his field he commits exactly the mistakes he accuses non-biologists of making when discussing biology.

He also highlights Dawkins' dichotomising of contemporary 'war' between Science and Religion as an outdated, local, holdover from an 19th century issue isolated primarily to England. McGrath points out that this war is basically non existent except for a few radicals on either side. It's like there are a few guys in the trenches shooting while the rest opf the soldiers are playing footy in no mans land.

McGrath is an excellent author, easily explaining technical, scientific and philosophical detail in a very approachable manner. I thoroughly recommend this book. It provides a considered view of what have, at times, be acrimonious allegations made by Dawkins.