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John Polkinghorne was born in England on October 16, 1930 to Dorothy Charlton and George Polkinghorne.
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John joined the Royal Army Educational Corps, where he had the job of teaching and demonstrating a variety of skills to personnel.
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John Polkinghorne went to Trinity College in Cambridge where he studied mathematics. He graduated as a senior wrangler in 1952, later returning to earn his PhD in physics in 1955.
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While completing his studies at Cambridge, John joined the Christian Union of UCCF which would later greatly influence the direction of his career. It was in the Christian Union that he met his future wife Ruth Martin
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John studied at the California Institute of Technology after accepting a postdoctoral Harkness Fellowship to attend there. It was there he had the golden opportunity of working with the distinguished physicist Murray Gell-Mann. At the end of his fellowship John accepted his first teaching position at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.
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John returned to Cambridge to teach. He quickly promoted from reader to professorship, a position he maintained for just over 10 years.
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For over 20 years Polkinghorne worked on theories about elementary particles and had a pivotal role in the discovery of the quark.
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In 1977 John believed that he had done his best work for science and math and would pursue what his heart was centered around, Christianity and ultimately becoming ordained. He officially became an ordained priest on June 6, 1982.
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In 2002, John received the Templeton prize along with its 1 million dollar prize for his lifelong work in proving spirituality and blurring the lines between science and religion. https://youtu.be/1zug4l5t-Hk
