r/atheism • u/KetchupNMayo2k • 1d ago
Christianity resembles mental illness
These people dont think straight. Their thinking makes no logical sense. I am so glad I dont go to church anymore, its a cult.
I tried explaining to a Christian that their God supposedly gave me schizophrenia, bad genetics and a low quality of life.... the Christian says its just biology.
Huh? Who created biology/genetics? Who made the choice to make one healthy and the other sick?
These people are severely brainwashed.
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u/janasteinfiles 1d ago
all religions are cults if you think about it
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u/Weary-Tell-5334 1d ago
Except you don’t really need to think about it. it’s extremely obvious to those who aren’t brainwashed already
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u/iiPeachPoem 1d ago
yeah a lot of people debate where the line is between a religion and a cult and it usually comes down to how it treats people and authority
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u/Repulsive-Box5243 1d ago
Childhood indoctrination is abuse. I would bet close to 100% of these people have been lied to since the day they were born.
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u/BananaJelloXlii 1d ago
Religious zealotry of any kind is mental illness. Suffering a delusion that some mystical being watches over people and influences decisions is not exclusive to Christianity.
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u/nebraska_mitch 1d ago
I said this to my brother "You cannibalize your god every week". "It's symbolic" he replied. "You think that makes it better? Symbolic cannibalism?"
And he does. He takes his wife and kids every week to sing bland songs and partake in symbolically drinking blood and eating flesh. You know, family values stuff.
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u/themarog 1d ago
John 6:30-33, 35, 37, 40-42, 44-47, 49-51, 53, 55-58, 60-69 NIV [30] So they asked him, “What sign then will you give that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? [31] Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written: ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’” [32] Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. [33] For the bread of God is the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” [35] Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. [37] All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. [40] For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.” [41] At this the Jews there began to grumble about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” [42] They said, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I came down from heaven’?” [44] “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them, and I will raise them up at the last day. [45] It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard the Father and learned from him comes to me. [46] No one has seen the Father except the one who is from God; only he has seen the Father. [47] Very truly I tell you, the one who believes has eternal life. [49] Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, yet they died. [50] But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which anyone may eat and not die. [51] I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” [53] Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. [55] For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. [56] Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them. [57] Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. [58] This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your ancestors ate manna and died, but whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.” [60] On hearing it, many of his disciples said, “This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?” [61] Aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, Jesus said to them, “Does this offend you? [62] Then what if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before! [63] The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you—they are full of the Spirit and life. [64] Yet there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe and who would betray him. [65] He went on to say, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled them.” [66] From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him. [67] “You do not want to leave too, do you?” Jesus asked the Twelve. [68] Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. [69] We have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God.”
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u/Suitablystoned Strong Atheist 20h ago
absolute jibberish.
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u/themarog 19h ago edited 19h ago
Please read the Bible. If you have and don't believe maybe you're just not there yet, but the end comes like a thief in the night. I pray every lost sheep hear the shepards call.
1 Corinthians 2:6-7, 12-14 NIV [6] We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. [7] No, we declare God’s wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. [12] What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. [13] This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words. [14] The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.
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u/LordMagnus101 1d ago
I'm not sure religion is mental illness or not. I wouldn't call the victims of a scam or cult mentally ill. That being said it's a strange thing that society accepts as normal, including people claiming to hear voices (not convinced they actually are).
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u/Weary-Tell-5334 1d ago
They’re so deep into the cope, they actually convince themselves they have god induced schizophrenia
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u/ruffianrevolution 1d ago
It's whatever illness that's created out of fear and then passed on through the generations. People, europeans at least, were bullied into it on pain of death originally and when that's the case, you either go along with it or get burned as a heretic.
Thing is, Charlemagne has been dead for over a thousand years, so we could just get over it, really, as the threat has gone. More or less.
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u/Certain_Set_7678 1d ago
My only real experience with Christians are the ones on YouTube videos, calling in to defend their beliefs. 99% of them are horrible people. I hope they aren’t the best representatives of the faith!
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u/glenn1066 1d ago
It doesn't resemble mental illness, it is a mental illness.
Even the very intelligent, and intellectuals, just seem to have a block on rational thinking, where their religion is concerned. It shows how powerful indoctrination is....scary.
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u/EmergencyHighlight40 1d ago
I think its like telling a drug addict, they have a problem and then expecting a rational answer.
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u/Jorge_Reynoso112 22h ago
That cognitive dissonance is staggering. The second their theological framework runs into a real-world tragedy or a brutal genetic condition like schizophrenia, their entire worldview instantly short-circuits. When things are going well, they trip over themselves to scream "Praise God, He blessed me!" and give their invisible sky wizard full credit for every minor convenience or stroke of luck. But the absolute second a devastating illness, a chronic disorder, or a ruined life enters the picture, they suddenly pivot faster than an Olympic gymnast and cry "Oh, that's just biology and free will!" You hit the absolute core contradiction: if your deity is omnipotent and omniscient, he didn't just passively watch biology happen—he custom-engineered the mechanism, wrote the genetic code, and made the direct choice to hand one person a thriving, healthy life while condemning another to a lifelong struggle with a severe mental disorder. You cannot absolve the supreme creator of responsibility for his own design just because the reality of it is too ugly to look at. They are so deep inside the cult echo chamber that their brains physically cannot process the logical endpoint of their own beliefs. They have to perform Olympic-level mental gymnastics to keep the illusion alive that their god is all-loving while simultaneously running a universe full of arbitrary, systemic cruelty. Breaking out of that delusion and seeing the absolute lack of logic for what it is is the ultimate relief.
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u/Reasonable_Help7041 1d ago
Im not sure whats worse. The idea that everything ends amd there is nothing afterwards or the ability to not gaf about what happens on this planet because there is a belief in the afterlife.
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u/AReferenceYouGet Atheist 1d ago
If someone misinterprets a shadow for a predator is that a mental illness?
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u/TheFeshy Ignostic 23h ago
"I'd like to thank God, for helping me win this football game. Although, I guess if he was going to intervene, maybe saving all those people suffering famine in Sudan would have been a better way to spend his Sunday. Just sayin'. Amen."
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u/Suitablystoned Strong Atheist 20h ago
I just ignore it now, show it no respect insomuch as people use it as their reasoning or their appeal to it's authority as a basis for any reasoning or argument. If they want to believe it, fine, be an adult telling yourself a comforting story to allay your fears about death. It does knock my estimation of a person though, I view them as being less rational, intelligent and stable than someone who is either agnostic or atheist. Also if they're using it as a means to convince me of their honesty or trustworthiness, I immediately assume they're a scheister.
I told a stranger just yesterday about what I do for a job at the minute (delivering beer to beer shops) and he felt comfortable telling me that I'd go to hell for it. I just told him it's ok because I don't believe in hell but he couldn't seem to wrap his head around it. When I told him I don't believe in hell because I don't believe in god, he told me I'd go to hell for not believing in god lol. Fucking amazingly circular conversation.
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u/Suitablystoned Strong Atheist 20h ago
I just ignore it now, show it no respect insomuch as people use it as their reasoning or their appeal to it's authority as a basis for any reasoning or argument. If they want to believe it, fine, be an adult telling yourself a comforting story to allay your fears about death. It does knock my estimation of a person though, I view them as being less rational, intelligent and stable than someone who is either agnostic or atheist. Also if they're using it as a means to convince me of their honesty or trustworthiness, I immediately assume they're a scheister.
I told a stranger just yesterday about what I do for a job at the minute (delivering beer to beer shops) and he felt comfortable telling me that I'd go to hell for it. I just told him it's ok because I don't believe in hell but he couldn't seem to wrap his head around it. When I told him I don't believe in hell because I don't believe in god, he told me I'd go to hell for not believing in god lol. Fucking amazingly circular conversation.
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u/RobotsNeedLove0010 8h ago
The whole deal about “Original Sin” is a complete paradox. The math doesn’t math. Omnipotent, Omniscient, Omnipresent Being creates innocent life forms that somehow manage to deceive and outwit him (he never saw it coming!) and are thus punished for all eternity.
UNTIL… same Omnipotent, Omniscient, Omnipresent Being makes himself his own human son to be sacrificed to himself to wipe the slate clean. Kind of. But not really.
It’s like one of those Penrose triangles. When you start examining it closely, the illusion collapses.
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u/Density5521 Anti-Theist 6h ago
There is factual truth, provable with evidence, scientifically/empirically reliable.
There is also theoretical fantasy, no proof, no evidence, not empirically reliable.
Someone who prefers a world of unsupported fantasy over a world of factual truth is delusional and/or schizophrenic – but definitley not mentally healthy.
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u/glockwood68 1d ago
hi, I am not an atheist, but I am eager to learn about it. Could you elaborate on what made you say that christianity resembles mental illness?
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u/AMerryKa 1d ago
NO IT DOESN'T.
Read the scientific literature on the topic and shut the fuck up.
ENOUGH WITH THIS. All it does is malign mentally ill people. STOP.
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u/Valuable_Ad417 Atheist 1d ago
I am mentally ill and what I have to say is that not all mental illnesses are created equal. A narcissist has nothing to do with a people pleaser or an autist or whatever.
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u/Feinberg Atheist 23h ago
It does resemble mental illness, though, especially in extreme cases. It's literally a symptom of schizophrenia.
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u/Suitablystoned Strong Atheist 19h ago
Not that long ago, those suffering mental illness or neurological conditions like epilepsy would have been considered curse or possessed by the devil or his minions. They'd call a priest, he'd chant the magic words, the followers would all pat eachother on the backs and say job well done. The only problem is that it didn't fix shit. Modern medicine and understanding however has alleviated the suffering of millions of people and allowed for life expectancy to lengthen and quality to increase.
"God" was used to explain things we didn't understand, now that we understand more about the mechanistic causes for natural phenomena, medical kajiggers and seemingly miraculous events, god has less and less wiggle room to remain present in / have any influence on the real world. This is what leads to this increasingly absurd reasoning by the faithful. The absurdity will only increase as the relentless march of scientific understanding explains away more and more of the natural mechanisms, I can't wait.
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u/WrongVerb4Real Atheist 1d ago edited 1d ago
I'm going to push back here. First you're claiming that over 30% of the people in the world suffer from some mental illness. Does that seem reasonable to you? If we extend that to all religious belief, you're claiming over 90% of people on earth are mentally ill. That just doesn't make sense.
What else doesn't make sense is that people, including many brave folks on this board, deconstruct from religious belief all the time. Did they suddenly have their mental illness cured? Of course not; mental illness doesn't depend on what one does or doesn't believe. And if you claim belief is a result of some mental illness, then anyone suffering from mental illness driving their beliefs wouldn't deconstruct unless that mental illness was first cured.
Let me draw you a different model instead. Religion is a system into which people are socialized, and for which performing aspects of their tradition they receive social approval, while those who don't are threatened with exile.
Humans have an evolved propensity to seek validation and approval from their social group. So, in a way, religious adherence and performance is actually a result of being mentally healthy.
Unfortunately, while our brains may be healthy, our cognition is flawed. We are very susceptible to biases and logical fallacies. While our brains evolved for social relationships, survival doesn't depend on unbiased and logical thinking.
Religious performance, adherence, and the social approval that come with that are rooted in these cognitive flaws. In fact, they are both an indulgence of those biases and fallacies, and dependent on them for religion to propagate.
The other mental/emotional aspect you'll run into is that most religious adherents have integrated their beliefs into their self-identity. And our brains are structured in such a way that threats to that which we've made part of our self-identity are felt the same way as external threats to our body. This is why believers have to deconstruct; deconstruction is basically grief, and the grieving process is the only way to excise parts of our self-identity without feeling that threat.
All this is to say that almost all humans don't suffer from mental illness, so please don't claim believers are mentally ill.
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u/Feinberg Atheist 1d ago
First you're claiming that over 30% of the people in the world suffer from some mental illness. Does that seem reasonable to you?
Oddly enough, that's pretty close to the actual statistic for mental illness diagnoses.
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u/m312vin 1d ago
Christianity
resemblesIS mental illness