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Praise | ReviewsPraise
Publishers Weekly named Fingerprints of God one of the top 10 religion books of the year, and one of the top 100 books overall.
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The Christian Science Monitor named Fingerprints of God one of their top (24) nonfiction books of 2009.
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"The book is ambitious. Yet, Hagerty succeeds brilliantly in capturing the multifarious ways in which science and spirituality impinge on each other, without spiritualizing science or making spirituality the complement of a scientific worldview."
"With honesty, discernment, humor, grace— and an enormous amount of reporting—Barbara Bradley Hagerty takes on one of the fiercest controversies of the last 500 years: Can we measure faith? Fingerprints of God reads like an elegant mystery story as Bradley Hagerty launches a search for evidence of God within us and the universe as a whole. People of faith and science will be grateful for the chance to join her on her quest."
"Barbara Bradley Hagerty has done something truly remarkable here. She has brought her considerable reporting skills and wonderfully wry writing to the question of who or what is God. By meticulously documenting scientific studies and interspersing them with the experiences of a number of individuals, including herself, she opens doors to those answers. Fingerprints of God is its own scientific and spiritual journey, one well worth taking."
"Fingerprints of God is a courageous and immensely enjoyable book. In Barbara Bradley Hagerty's investigation of the science of spirituality, I found answers for questions I've pondered for years. Many people will find themselves in these pages."
"What a book! The pages crackle with fresh insights into the nexus of faith and science. Striking just the right balance between skepticism and open-mindedness, Bradley Hagerty makes for the perfect guide on this journey of discovery. Read this book. It'll inform and entertain – and just might change the way you view the world."
"You can find God in many places, from the condemned on death row to the deepest folds of the human brain. In this groundbreaking book on the emerging science of faith, Barbara Bradley Hagerty discovers the links between science and spiritual experience. Fingerprints of God will provoke you, intrigue you, and inspire you."
"In her first book, National Public Radio correspondent Hagerty acts as a tour guide through the rocky terrain of scientists who study religious experience. Is there a so-called “God gene”? Why do some people have mystical experiences while others never see the so-called light? Right up front, Hagerty reveals that this is not an entirely objective exercise. As a Christian, she wants to understand her own mystical encounter with the divine and why she believes when others do not. Yet to each interview, whether with a world-renowned neuroscientist or a back-road mystic, she brings a suitably skeptical eye. Along the way, she manages to explain some pretty cutting-edge science—psychoneuroimmunology, anyone?—and unravel some people’s pretty hard-to-comprehend religious experiences without sacrificing depth or complexity. Then, with equal aplomb, she dances off to peyote ceremonies, church services and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. The real beauty of this book lies in watching Hagerty gracefully balance her own trust in faith and science and, in the end, come down with one foot planted firmly in both."
Reviews
May 8, 2010 | Kathleen Parker: Pentagon bars Graham
Merced Sun-Star
May 2, 2010 | Fingerprints of God: The search for science of spirituality (a review)
Examiner.com
November 24, 2009 | Review - Fingerprints of God
Metapsychology - Online Reviews
June 25, 2009 | Scientific search for God leads reporter back to faith
Religion News
June 16, 2009 | Brain waves or beatific vision?
Philadelphia Inquirer
June 13, 2009 | Nonfiction review: 'Fingerprints of God'
San Francisco Chronicle
June 3, 2009 | "A window into the faith of religion reporters"
USA Today
May 29, 2009 | "Not By Faith Alone"
Washington Post
May 29, 2009 | "Editorial: Science, spirituality closer than you think"
Dallas Morning News editorial
May 27, 2009 | Interview with Religion editor David Crumm
Read the Spirit
May 19, 2009 | Book Reviews: Fingerprints of God
The Christian Science Monitor
May 17, 2009 | "Barbara Bradley Hagerty: Can Science Find God?"
Time Magazine interview
May 17, 2009 | "'FINGERPRINTS OF GOD' FAITH FACTS" | PDF Version
New York Post
May 2009 | "Author of the week: Barbara Bradley Hagerty"
The Week
"Like millions of other people, Barbara Bradley Hagerty once had a life-changing spiritual experience, said Amy Sullivan in Time.com. But Hagerty happens to be a National Public Radio correspondent, so when she sat down to write about God, she worried what skeptical colleagues would think of her. Her big moment happened 14 years ago, when Hagerty was interviewing a churchgoer under the circular glow of a lamppost. ‘The moment itself is hard to describe,’ she says. ‘It's as if someone stood on the edge of the circle and was breathing on us.’ The other woman stopped talking midsentence. ‘There was the presence of something else that was spiritual around us,’ Hagerty says. The feeling retreated like a wave, but left Hagerty curious to know how science explained such happenings. Writing a book on the topic, she says, was her attempt ‘to find out whether I was crazy or not.’
"The answers she arrives at in Fingerprints of God are likely to please neither evangelicals nor committed secularists, said Gregory M. Lamb in The Christian Science Monitor. Noting that half of Americans can also point to a transformation spiritual moment, Hagerty talks to scientists who trace such occurrences to simple brain chemistry; she consults a few who are studying whether the triggering force might sometimes reside ‘beyond this material world.’ Her hunch is that the believers are on to something. ‘Belief in God has not gone away,’ she says, ‘because people keep encountering Him, in unexplainable, intensely spiritual moments.’"
