Francis J. "Frank" Beckwith (born November 3, 1960) is an American philosopher, professor, scholar, speaker, writer, and lecturer.

He is currently Professor of Philosophy & Church-State Studies, Affiliate Professor of Political Science and Associate Director of the Graduate Program in Philosophy, at Baylor University, where he first served as Associate Director of Baylor's J. M. Dawson Institute of Church-State Studies.^[1][2][3][4]

Beckwith works in the areas of ethics, legal and political philosophy, philosophy of religion, and church-state jurisprudence.^[5]

Beckwith is well known for his legal and philosophical work on abortion, arguing in defense of the sanctity of life in several academic publications including his 2007 book Defending Life, published by Cambridge University Press,^[6] and his 1993 book, Politically Correct Death, published by Baker Publishing Group.^[7] He has also published multiple books examining current philosophical questions regarding religion, law and politics. His 2015 book, Taking Rites Seriously: Law, Politics and the Reasonableness of Faith, (Cambridge University Press),^[8] was the winner of the prestigious American Academy of Religion's 2016 Book Award for Excellence in the Study of Religion in the category of Constructive-Reflective Studies.^[9]

In May 2007, he returned to the Catholicism of his youth, after decades as an Evangelical Protestant.^[10] This inspired him to write a book describing his faith journey, titled Return to Rome: Confessions of an Evangelical Catholic published by Brazos Press.^[11] It is compared with Scott Hahn's Rome Sweet Home, as a significant work of Catholic Apologetics.^[12]

Life, education and academic appointments

Beckwith was born in Brooklyn, New York and grew up in Las Vegas, Nevada. He is a graduate of Bishop Gorman High School, where he was a member of the 1978 AAA Basketball high school state championship team.^[1][13][14] His siblings include the writer, comic, and actress Elizabeth Beckwith.^[15]

Francis Beckwith earned a B.A. in philosophy from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV). He later earned his MA in apologetics from Simon Greenleaf University, Anaheim, which merged with Trinity International University, Illinois in 1996. Beckwith earned his doctorate from Fordham University (PhD. and M.A. in philosophy), and his MJS (Master of Juridical Studies) from the Washington University School of Law, St. Louis.^[1]

A condensed version of Beckwith's 1984 M.A. thesis on the Baháʼí Faith was published by Bethany House, as Baha'i [sic]: A Christian Response in 1985.^[16]

In 2001, Beckwith completed his Wash. U. M.J.S dissertation on the inclusion of intelligent design in public school science curricula. In 2003, Rowman and Littlefield published his dissertation in revised and expanded form as Law, Darwinism, and Public Education: The Establishment Clause and the Challenge of Intelligent Design.

Prior to arriving at Baylor in July 2003, he was a Visiting Research Fellow (2002–2003) in the James Madison Program in the Politics Department at Princeton University.^[17] He has also held full-time academic appointments at UNLV (Lecturer in Philosophy, 1989–96), Whittier College (Assistant Professor of Philosophy, 1996–97),^[18] and Trinity International University (Associate Professor Philosophy, Culture, and Law, 1997-2002).^[19] Beckwith has also held two visiting endowed appointments: (2008-2009) Mary Anne Remick Senior Visiting Fellow in the de Nicola Center for Ethics & Culture at the University of Notre Dame,^[20] and (2016–2017) Visiting Scholar in Conservative Thought and Policy in the Benson Center for Western Civilization, Thought, and Policy at the University of Colorado, Boulder.^[21]

In November 2006, Beckwith became the 58th president of the Evangelical Theological Society (ETS),^[22] only to resign both his presidency and membership in May 2007, a week after he returned to the Catholic Church.^[23] Over a decade later, he became the 90th president of the American Catholic Philosophical Association (ACPA).^[24] From 1995 to 2007, he was a fellow at The Center for Bioethics & Human Dignity^[25]

In 2003, after his appointment as associate director of the J. M. Dawson Institute of Church-State Studies at Baylor, 29 members of the Dawson family called on Baylor University to remove Beckwith as associate director. The Dawson family members questioned the appointment, accusing Beckwith of holding church-state positions contrary to Dawson's beliefs on the separation of church and state,^[26] largely because of Beckwith's affiliation with the Discovery Institute (DI) and his work on intelligent design and public education.^[27] Beckwith argued that their concerns were not well founded and that they represented a fundamental misunderstanding of his positions.^[28] In summer 2007 Beckwith dropped his affiliation with Discovery. He has subsequently published works highly critical of intelligent design, including chapters in his award-winning 2015 book Taking Rites Seriously'^[29] and his 2019 book Never Doubt Thomas: The Catholic Aquinas as Evangelical and Protestant. ^[30]

He currently resides with his wife in Texas.