My mother and I were having a religious discussion a few days ago and she brought up a very interesting idea. She said that she thinks that humans develop a psychological need for religion because of their parents. Religion plays a similar role to grown humans that parents play to children. People need someone, either a person or a supernatural higher power, to look up to and to be in control of their lives. Also, parents/religion give people advice and rules on what to do and what not to do. In her theory, were it not for our societal structure of parents raising their children, people would not develop a need for religion to take their parents' place. I think it's interesting too to think about how in Christianity, God is even referred to as "the holy father" and people are "God's children". And I can definitely see how being part of a religious community can give the illusion of a non-biological family. Basically, under this theory religion is going to be part of the human experience indefinitely since I can't imagine society changing to have all humans raised away from their parents, like Brave New World or some other sci-fi vision of the future.
While I agree that there is some innate human need for understanding the world that religion very conveniently fills, this theory is not a perfect explanation. Christianity fits the mold very well, especially with the terminology of father and children. For that matter, monotheistic religions in general seem to fit the explanation of religion-playing-the-role-of-parent. However, I'm sure there are polytheistic religions that don't fit the mold as well. In this case, it is merely the overall function of religion that fills in for the overall function of a parent. The biggest place where polytheistic religions don't fit is in the ability for individuals to form a relationship with God in the way that a child forms a one-on-one relationship with his mother or father. Furthermore, this psychological view does not explain anti-theism. Atheists may not be organized like Christians or Muslims or Hindus, but Atheism is still a religious belief system. In this case, the only connection I can see is Atheists look to science to explain the world as a child looks to his parent. There are some holes in specific applications of this theory, but the general idea is an interesting rationalization of why people seem to have an innate need for religion.
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That's an interesting way of looking at it. I don't know that I would agree that we need that parental role throughout our lives though. It seems to me like some people do need that kind of control from someone or something else in their lives, so they turn to God. But then, people have morals without that. My mother is not religious at all, but she is probably the nicest person I know. She has her own morals, which she sees as basic human morals, but without having that come from a higher power. So my question would be, where do those morals come from? Maybe it's because we don't know that we attribute them to a higher power. No idea, those are just my thoughts on it.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with the parent role, at least in Christianity. It especially makes sense when you think about the punishing god and the loving god- both sides are needed for parents too. I believe that some people do need religion but others don't. Going along with the comment above, some people do get their morals from religion and/or parents. Some get their morals from peers or I dunno, maybe even movies or media. Essentially, I think the environment gives us our morals (not to get too deep into the nature/nurture debate).
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