How to Believe the Best of Someone You Strongly Disagree With (Part 2)

This is part two of a three-part series on how to believe the best of those we disagree with—especially politically. See part one here.

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Well, we are past the date of the mid-term elections but not past the reverberations in the news cycle or around the water cooler at work. As you have no doubt noticed, there are still plenty of opportunities to figure out how to believe the best of those we strongly disagree with.

In part one of this blog series, I investigated a few big-picture aspects of this topic, including one of the most obvious questions you might be asking: Why should we care about doing such a thing in the first place???  (I also shared a crucial caveat about when we must set this particular action aside. So go back and look at part one if you haven’t already.)

With those elements as the foundation, let’s now get ultra-practical. How do we put “believing the best” into practice? Because ultimately, this is a skill that is needed today far beyond politics—since, unfortunately, we tend to find a lot to disagree about in other areas of life too! This is just as crucial for interacting with the infuriating colleague who is advocating for a company rule that you strongly oppose, as it is for interacting with those parents who are eagerly implementing what you view as the damaging ideas of a new school board.

Let’s tackle two practical steps today, and then we’ll wrap it up with four more in part three next week.

Step #3: Fight the temptation to view the “other side” as evil

If we are going to love those with whom we disagree (see part one), this is the most pivotal transition step. We have to overcome the temptation to view the “other side” as not just wrong in their opinions but as disturbed and destructive in their very character. We have to recognize how easy it is to slip into thinking that someone isn’t just holding bad opinions; rather, they must be a bad person because of those opinions. Because otherwise, how could they believe such a thing??

It might surprise you to remember that among the non-political class, this negative view is a relatively new phenomenon. Not many decades ago, ordinary people used to mingle in our public spaces—the school, the church, the flag football game—and recognized that those around them might radically disagree on politics…but that was normal and fine. Ted and Mike might get into a sharp verbal debate about something, and then Ted would invite Mike over for a beer after the game. Angie and Kayla might strongly advocate for opposing school board policies but might otherwise be good friends at school functions.

But today, if someone is advocating for a policy or opinion we view as damaging, it is too easy to assume something is deeply wrong inside of them. Why would we want to invite that person over for a beer?

All the polls today show that most of us have started making assumptions about “the other side’s” judgment, motives, and character, based solely on their political beliefs. And the more we pull back into our little bubble of those who share our opinion, the more poorly we view those outside of it.

For example, a 2025 YouGov poll found that as people identified more and more strongly with one political party, they were more and more likely to view members of the opposite party not just as mistaken in their opinions but as actually “evil.”  On average, roughly 60% of these partisans had come to view the other side that way. And that trend is accelerating.

I was stunned by a 2022 Pew poll showing a dramatic increase over just the prior six years in people thinking those of the other party are not just misguided but closed-minded, dishonest and immoral. I wish we had updated apples-to-apples data for the four years since 2022… but does anyone think that those numbers have improved?

So how do we counter this sneaky and often subconscious tendency?

Step #4: Recognize that the other person’s beliefs are based on what they think would be most right and caring—just like ours are

If fighting the temptation to view others as evil is the first transition step, recognizing the good motivation inside others is the second. These are actually two sides of the same coin.

Before I dive into that, let me be clear about something: I am not advocating for the idea that we are naturally good inside. The Bible—not to mention our human experience—is pretty clear that the opposite is true! We are all deeply, deeply impacted by the selfish human nature inside each one of us. (When Jeff and I were living in New York and attending Tim Keller’s church, we were amused by Tim’s response to someone who asked the blunt question, “How can you believe in the idea of original sin?” Tim’s dry answer: “Clearly you’ve never spent time with a two-year-old.”)

But even though we are all imperfect, sinful people, we also all have a conscience. We all have a sense for right and wrong, good and bad (see Romans 2:14-15). And most average people try in the best way they know how to be good instead of bad. For example, in a 2022 poll, 86% of U.S. adults said being moral was somewhat or very important to them. And according to a 2025 Pew poll and other research, most people have strikingly similar ideas of what “morality” means: Having honesty and integrity instead of deception; caring for and protecting others, especially those most vulnerable; being kind and living out the Golden Rule (doing to others as we would want others to do to us); working for justice and fighting injustice; loving our children well.

Nearly everyone strongly believes in those goals!

The issue, of course, is that we often end up with opposite ideas of how to get there. But for our purposes, the crucial step is recognizing that, almost certainly, those individuals on the “other side” are actively working toward the same ultimate goals. Kindness, honesty, justice, and so on. They are working toward what they believe would be most right and caring for everyone and for our country, even if I might strongly disagree that “their way” would lead to those goals. But the way they see the world—influenced by their personal experiences, upbringing, faith beliefs, and individual circumstances—has simply led to them holding an opinion that is very different from mine.

I might think that person is wrong. Even deceived. I might view their approach as likely to become destructive or damaging. But as noted in part one, I’m still called to love. And one key way to love that person the way Jesus calls us to is to remind ourselves that their beliefs come from genuine concern and caring for others—just like ours do. To put ourselves in their shoes and develop empathy for where they are coming from, even as we continue to disagree.

There are four final steps that will help us do that—including a very important challenge—which I’ll cover next week in part three.

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