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"This book presents the case for Compassionate Reasoning as a moral and psychosocial skill for the positive transformation of individuals and societies. It has been developed from a reservoir of moral philosophical, cultural, and religious wisdom traditions over the centuries. These have been derived from a careful combination of classical schools of ethical thought that are artfully combined with compassion neuroscience, contemporary approaches to conflict resolution, public health methodologies, and positive psychological approaches to social change. There is an urgent need for human civilization to invest in the broad-based cultivation of compassionate thoughts, feelings, and especially habits. This skill is then combined with moral reasoning to move the self and others toward less anger and fear, more joy and care in the pursuit of reasonable policies that build peaceful families, communities, and societies. There are many people across the planet who work every day for the sake of others but who are ensconced in exhausting work with dangerous and difficult situations of conflict. These people are often heroic bridge-builders and creators of peaceful societies, and they have a common set of cultivated moral character traits and psychosocial skills. They tend to be kinder, more reasonable, more self-controlled, and more goal-oriented to peace. They are united by a particular set of moral values and the emotional skills to put those values into practice. The aim of this book is to articulate the best combination of those values and skills that lead to personal and communal sustainability, not burnout and self-destruction. The book pivots on the observable difference in the mind-and proven in neuroscience imaging experiments-between destructive empathic distress, on the one hand, and, on the other, joyful, constructive, compassionate care. Facing existential threats to life on the planet, humans can and must make such skills universally sustainable and ingrained"--

To Make the Earth Whole studies the art of citizen diplomacy_a process that can address clashes of religion and culture across regional lines even when traditional negotiations between governments can fail. Using a five-year experiment in Syria as the central case study, Marc Gopin outlines the way to create community across lines of enmity, the social network theory to explain how this happens, and the long-term vision required for a progressive but inclusive global community that respects religious communities even as it limits their coercive power over others

This work represents an innovative attempt to integrate the study of religion with the study of conflict resolution. Marc Gopin argues that religion can play a critical role in constructing a global community of shared moral commitments and vision - a community that can limit conflict to its non-violent, constructive variety.