Religion and mental health

Many people - particularly some "sophisticated" intelligent people - believe that being religious is a sign of mental illness. In fact, the official psychiatric classification system of the American Psychiatric System - the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual  5 - lists religious beliefs as psychiatric symptoms found in several psychiatric diagnoses. However, there is no empirical support for this to be found in the research literature. Those who are mentally ill may be religious, but they may not be just as those who do not may be religious or they may not. There is no evidence for a direct relationship.

How did this notion get traction? It all goes back to the writings of Sigmund Freud, the neurologist who developed the theory of personality and psychotherapy called psychoanalysis beginning in the late nineteenth century. Freud - neither a psychologist nor psychiatrist - was personally hostile to religion, and he incorporated the following explanation in his theory: those, who as young children fail to develop adequate identification with a father figure, are susceptible to taking the concept of "God" as a substitute father figure. According to Freud, the father figure provides a basis of learning self-control and morality. So in the absence of the development of a strong father figure from whom to learn these traits, "God" and his attributes are substituted. 

In the early twentieth century, the theory of psychoanalysis was very popular among those who considered themselves well-educated and intellectual, particularly in America.  However, in recent decades , the mental health field has escaped from the oppression of psychoanalytic theory, and among most current practitioners, there is no longer an assumption of a direct relationship between religious belief and mental illness.