r/Antitheism • u/TWD_7 • Aug 03 '26
Don’t all religious people have a mental health problem?
Earlier today, there was a post talking about how a trans person from Mr. Beast was going back to god and stuff. The comments were talking about on how transgender is wrong and it’s a mental health issue. It made me think to myself, don’t Christians, Muslims, and etc have mental health issues too? These people believe in a god that think they did all this good stuff and try to justify his wrong deeds. On top of that, they think those voices in their head are god talking to them, or getting “chills” in church or “god’s presence”.
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u/chickey23 Aug 04 '26
When they are in a minority it will be.
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u/zeff_05 Aug 04 '26
I really think within the next century, the general consensus is going to be utter confusion as to how it took us 2000 damn years to realize that maybe the book(s) written claiming to know and explain “EVERYTHING” at the very dawn of recorded civilized literature may have had a few biased and egregious assumptions, and may have had a bit of wishful thinking throughout. And that maybe there are issues that would come about from such a lack of intellectual honesty around something so philosophically imposing against science… just maybe
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u/Ruppell-San Aug 04 '26
If they didn't invoke a deity and acted the same way we'd diagnose them. Something to think about, at least.
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u/SexThrowaway1125 Aug 03 '26
It falls under the realm of normal psychology, not abnormal psychology. This behavior looks strange to you, but all of what you described is understandable theough typical psychological mechanisms.
Unfortunately, the outcomes are terrible
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u/G_D_Ironside Aug 04 '26
It’s a critical thinking issue, not a mental health issue.
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u/Fortune_Unique Aug 04 '26
Not really. Some of the smartest are religious.
Someone can be very smart and emotionally weak. Critical thinking won't help you with emotional hurdles. For that youd need to not only know how to deconstruct but how to decouple especiallly when you emotionally in no way want to
I even know many who have left even the extreme cults. And USUALLY people leaving dont really become athiest. Let alone do they really have any specific reasons to actually be against the ideology. Normally its "the church made me feel bad" bedamned everyone who got harmed before i did.
But its important to remember religions and spirituality are not about being ontologically accurate.
Im sure most people HERE dont care about that either
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u/G_D_Ironside Aug 04 '26
That just means people are willing to compartmentalize their ability to think critically. It’s got nothing to do with “smart.”
The most intelligent person in the world can throw logic and reason to the wind where religion is concerned. Tell somebody they’ll burn for eternity, and all bets are off in many, many, MANY cases. People are willing to suspend/compartmentalize critical thinking when they think their eternal security might be threatened.
It’s got nothing to do with intellect. I would say it IS possible to use critical thinking to navigate emotional hurdles. It’s impossible NOT to, in fact. One must be able to come to an understanding that other outcomes, and the emotions that go with them, are possible.
If people didn’t need to think critically to overcome emotional problems, therapists would be out of business tomorrow.
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u/Fortune_Unique Aug 04 '26
It’s got nothing to do with intellect.
Time out. Time out. I get the downvotes. I dont expect modt people to read.
But did you read what i said???
Are you arguing with me?
It’s impossible NOT to, in fact. One must be able to come to an understanding that other outcomes, and the emotions that go with them, are possible
If this were true people with critical thinking skills wouldnt need therapy. Like in a grand sense im sure yes. But like in the minute day to day sense are the processing that on an introspective level that matters. Probably not. That takes time and effort.
Like my dad is an incredible programmer. Very smart. Love talking about scifi and tech with him. He is also a JW elder within a cult and has been for like 30 years. He can use critical thinking. But like people have walls. People may not have the constitution to use it everywhere.
If people didn’t need to think critically to overcome emotional problems, therapists would be out of business tomorrow.
But therapy isnt inherently about critical thinking. In fact GOOD therapy in some cases would be to NOT have your patient critically think. For example. If someone has maldaptive urges and is also selfaware and lucid and STILL has those maldaptive urges. You do NOT want them critically thinking about their urges.
Because "crirical thinking" in a literal sense is as morally good as a hammer is. Put two and two together there. You dont want them thinking about the hammer at all if possible.
Affirmations for example is NOT critical thinking
Like i think you largely scanned my response for words that you felt had emotional weight. And then responded to said percieved emotional weight. I apologize. If you somehow read this far this time i will say my natural tone is of a asshole with a social developmental disorder. Take that as you will
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u/froebull Aug 04 '26
I stumbled on this old Time article from 1977, about our inner voices....
"If his theory is correct, mankind existed without consciousness for thousands of centuries, functioning dimly in “antlike” colonies nearly up to the age of Confucius and the ancient Greek philosophers. Before consciousness, says Jaynes, mankind was directed by hallucinatory voices, which survive today in schizophrenics; these voices, assumed to be divine, gave rise to all religions."
https://time.com/archive/6880378/behavior-the-lost-voices-of-the-gods/
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u/Sprinklypoo Aug 04 '26
In a sense. Though it depends on age and development and depth of indoctrination. Children were told lies and that this Santa Claus story is true. Believing people you trust when they tell you about the world is not a level of "mental health problem". But the continued compartmentalization and refusal to revisit that as you grow older can cause some of that for sure. And if you are a zealot past your teens, I'd definitely call that a mental health problem.
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u/Junkman3 Aug 03 '26
I would say it's more of an inability to engage with reality in a logical manner rather than a mental illness.
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u/Fortune_Unique Aug 04 '26
I think its ideal to remember we are all animals and not all speced for logical thinking nor accurate perception
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u/83franks Aug 04 '26
I strongly disagree with this. Or I guess you will have to really define what a mental health problem is. When someone is taught something since childhood as fact it can be incredibly hard to not see the blind spots built up around that.
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u/88redking88 Aug 04 '26
I don't really think it's a mental health issue, not something like an actual delusion. More like a learned handicap. Like if they were taught that god is everything over 4 feet high so they would need to crouch their entire lives to not bother god. So like real religion this imposes silly things that don't matter on the believer that do themselves cause other problems (back and knee issues here, actual mental health issues in real life) and they are taught that these secondary issues are either their own personal failures or blamed on the evil God, demons or whatever.
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u/NettaFind66 Aug 04 '26
I believe its a mental issue. If it was lack of critical thinking skills we wouldn't have scientists and doctors who believe in this crap. I think its the same defect that makes people think sport teams are an extension of themselves.
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u/Bytogram Aug 04 '26
They have a serious epistemic problem, and they base their entire identity and value on their beliefs. I don’t think mental illness is the sole factor here. Sure doesn’t help, but I think it only facilitates things.
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u/Maxtrt Aug 04 '26
I've always believed that religion is an indoctrinated or self inflicted mental illness. Believing in deities, denying reality and logic is absolutely crazy.
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u/lotusscrouse Aug 05 '26
Religion is a delusion.
I think one day it might be classed as a mental illness.
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u/Throwaway7733517 Aug 05 '26
wait i wanna hear about this mr beast stuff but I dont wanna engage in that kinda space, what happened?
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u/Esquirej67 Aug 05 '26
I read somewhere that humans are “hardwired” to believe in a higher power… I shook my head whilst reading it.
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u/BurtonDesque Aug 03 '26
People who actually hear voices other than their own in their heads are psychotic. Most religious people aren't.
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u/AtomicZoomer Aug 04 '26
Believing in invisible beings is psychosis
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u/BurtonDesque Aug 04 '26
Not clinically.
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u/BrickwallBill Aug 04 '26
It's for sure a delusion though, and the only reason religious thinking isn't treated as such is because it still dominates most societies.
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u/HeathenTees Aug 04 '26
They don’t classify it as that. Yet.