J. Neil Alexander
Dean’s Professor of Anglican Studies
Degrees
ThD, The General Theological Seminary, 1993
MDiv, Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary, 1980
MA, University of South Carolina, 1979
BA, Moravian College, 1976
The Rt. Rev. J. Neil Alexander joined Candler in the fall of 2026 as Dean’s Professor of Anglican Studies. He is the former bishop of the Diocese of Atlanta and dean emeritus of the School of Theology at the University of the South. At Candler, Alexander teaches Anglican studies courses part-time and works with students in the school’s Episcopal and Anglican Studies program.
Alexander was elected the ninth bishop of the Diocese of Atlanta on March 31, 2001, and was ordained and installed on July 7, 2001, at the Cathedral of St. Philip in Atlanta.
He previously served as the Norma and Olan Mills Professor of Divinity at the University of the South School of Theology, and the Trinity Church Professor of Liturgics and Preaching at The General Theological Seminary, New York City, as well as in a variety of parish settings. He has also taught at Yale, Drew and Wilfrid Laurier universities.
He is the author of This Far by Grace: A Bishop’s Journey Through Questions About Homosexuality, as well a number of publications in the fields of liturgics, homiletics, sacramental theology and pastoral practice.
BOOKS
Celebrating Liturgical Time: Days, Weeks, and Seasons, Church Publishing, 2014
This Far by Grace: A Bishop’s Journey Through Questions About Homosexuality, Cowley, 2003
CHAPTERS AND ARTICLES
“Eucharistic Prayers in the Prayer Book Tradition,” in The Oxford Handbook of the Book of Common Prayer, Oxford University Press, 367-381, 2026
“The Future of the Past: Thoughts on the Sacramentality of Time,” in The T & T Clark Handbook of Sacraments and Sacramentality, T&T Clark/Bloomsbury, 69-80, 2023
“Of Sacraments and Sundays,” in Common Prayer: Reflections on Episcopal Worship, Cascade Books, 2019
“Under the Mercy: Liturgical Patterns of Reconciliation through the Centuries,” in Ambassadors for God: Envisioning Reconciliation Rites for the 21st Century, (Liturgical Studies V), Church Publishing, 1-15, 2010
“Deeply Rooted, Provokingly Thoughtful, Richly Practical: A Tribute to the Scholarship of Marion Josiah Hatchett,” The Sewanee Theological Review, 2010