Do you wish to grow in your ability to love your neighbors? Are you intrigued by how psychological concepts and religious principles might come together to offer perspectives on the facilitators and barriers to loving our neighbors across cultural differences? Drawing from psychology and religion, my colleagues Katie Douglass and Brittany Tausen recently wrote a book that is full of insights and practical applications for how we might deepen our interpersonal connections and treat others with more kindness. In an interview with me, Katie (a practical theologian) and Brittany (a social psychologist) responded to a few questions about their work:

Paul Youngbin Kim: For the average religious person, loving our neighbors is not a controversial idea. But why does religion sometimes inflict more harm than good on this front? How might we counter this tendency?

Brittany Tausen: Religion can be leveraged as a motivator to love all well, or as a way to draw boundaries around who to love and who not to love. It is when religion is used to build walls and craft an overly narrow definition of ‘neighbor’ that it tends to inflict the most harm. When religion is used to underscore the dignity and worth of all human beings, that is when there is the greatest potential for religious traditions to fuel the prosocial behavior necessary for individual and communal flourishing.

The tendency for religious identities to intensify........

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