In your opinion what causes christians to believe in Jesus

[Alan V]

What good are psychological insights if they can't be applied by relatively well-read laypeople?
These days anyone can Google....

Yeah, that's the problem. You think that a superficial access to information imbues you with expertise. It is also highly irresponsible for you to pickpocket psychological theories as tools to self-diagnose and diagnose others. 

Well, I can certainly understand why you object, since I so obviously include you in the same category.

Consistency is an accomplishment which too few people are clever enough to pull off. I certainly did not in my own lifetime, so I understand the problem personally.

This is so backwards. The theory predicts that we are motivated to maintain consistency between our beliefs and behaviors: when there is dissonance we quickly seek to resolve it. So why are you saying consistency is an accomplishment few pull off, when the theory views consistency as the baseline we are always at and always strive to return to?

I'm sure as a psychologist that you know all about compartmentalization. Google again: "When someone compartmentalizes, they mentally separate and isolate different aspects of their life or thoughts from each other. This can involve keeping work issues separate from personal life, separating positive and negative aspects of oneself, or putting difficult emotions into a separate mental 'box.' Compartmentalization can be a defense mechanism to cope with overwhelming emotions or avoid cognitive dissonance, but it can also have negative consequences if it prevents the individual from fully addressing difficult issues."

My problem, if you really want to call it that, is that I have to at least try to be honest. I aim for accuracy, and that requires a lot of reading.

No, I will not leave such issues to experts if I see they have some clear conflict of interest. And by the way, I assume you are a great help to people exactly because of your own combinations of incompatible ideas. I assume you function as a sort of half-way house for people with mental problems caused by their religious beliefs, many of which I thankfully no longer share.

IMO science generally works much better when it isn't combined with religious ideas. Obviously I am probably wrong concerning certain classes of people, but then I never claimed to be a therapist.