Psychological Exploration of Human Understanding of Divine Realities: From Well-Being to Imagination

This editorial introduces the empirical and theoretical works in this special issue, which examine questions about how people conceive of and think about divine realities, emotional and intellectual understandings of the divine, and the relationship between God representations and outcomes such as coping, health, faith development and leadership, and artistic expression. These examples are situated within a broader conversation about the tensions, concerns, opportunities and benefits of cross-disciplinary research between psychology and theology, including mutual theoretical refinement and exchange of methods, and the research posture involved in developing successful research. Key among these is the value of a researching community to which we suggest this special edition contributes in a modest way, especially through curating roundtable discussions on the two themes of “Cultural and psychological resources for well-being” and “Imagining the Divine and the implications for practice.” This editorial aims to illuminate entryways for scholars thinking about the challenges and features of research across these disciplines and support the emergence and growth of new researchers working at this frontier.