The Fingerprint of God

Will Dickerson ’80, PhD ’92

Dickerson, who holds a master’s of divinity degree from Princeton as well as a doctorate in medieval history from Cornell, is a pastor who has spent nearly three decades with One Mission Hungary, a nonprofit based in Budapest, where he also teaches English at a secondary school. In his book, subtitled Reflections on Love and Its Practice, Dickerson argues that human love is evidence of God’s existence. “As a species, when we do not experience the love of our friends and family on a regular basis, we generally fail to thrive,” he observes in the introduction. “The necessity of love, however, raises a new set of questions. If we live in a dog-eat-dog world in which the strong and powerful are the ones most likely to pass along their genetic material, how could love, which puts the needs and interests of others before its own, have ever come into existence, much less have become a requirement for our existence?”