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Sandy McDonald

Scottish minister

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 4, 2026
Entity authorityQ7417369 ↗
Source-derived summary

Alexander McDonald (5 November 1937 – 17 March 2016) was a Scottish minister of the Church of Scotland who served as the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland from 1997 to 1998.

Biography

McDonald was born in Bishopbriggs in 1937, the son of Jessie (known as Jeanette) Helen Low and Alexander M. McDonald. He worked in the timber industry in the 1950s, prior to National Service in the Royal Air Force. He studied at the University of Glasgow before training for the ministry at Trinity College.

Following theological studies in the 1960s, his first position after completing his studies was in the rural Church of Scotland, in Longriggend, north Lanarkshire, he served as minister at St David's Parish Church, Bathgate (1968–1974), then at St Mark's Parish Church, Ralston (1974–1988) and then as General Secretary of the Church of Scotland's Board of Ministry until he retired in 2002. He was Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland from 1997 to 1998. His formal title (following the end of his Moderatorial year) was The Very Reverend Dr. Alexander McDonald.

Television career

In the early 1980s, he co-presented the Scottish Television religious magazine programme That's the Spirit! and was also interviewed on VIP, also an STV religious show.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Sandy McDonald” as scottish minister. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1937, 2016, 1997, 1998—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1937-11-05. The account is most persuasive where Sandy, McDonald and Scottish can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as scottish minister. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7417369. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1937, 2016, 1997 and 1998.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
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  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
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The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

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  2. Expand the search: follow Sandy McDonald primary sources, Sandy McDonald archive and Sandy research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Sandy McDonald” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.