Religion: Faith: Healthy v. Neurotic

Theologically speaking, faith is a gift of God. But in the cold-eyed view of the trained psychiatrist, religious belief may also be a cover-up for deep inner anxiety and a cause of neurosis. Dr. Leon Salzman, professor of clinical psychiatry at Georgetown University medical school, argues that it is often difficult "to determine where religion ends and disease begins." At the annual meeting in Washington of the Academy of Religion and Mental Health, a number of psychiatrists and clergymen tried to define the tenuous borderline between healthy and neurotic faith.

Church-Induced Guilt. Both clergymen and doctors agreed that authoritarian religion can be a major source of neurosis. Salzman noted some symptoms of unhealthy faith that often show up among new adherents to dogmatic churches: "an irrational intensity of belief" in the new doctrine, greater concern for form and theology than for ethical and moral principles, hatred of past beliefs, intolerance of deviation, and the desire for martyrdom to prove devotion. Jesuit Philosopher and Critic William F. Lynch added that neurotic religion frequently shows up among Roman Catholics as a denial of human feelings, a desire to find the will of God in every decision, and an unhealthy dependence on dogma as a means of obtaining absolute certainty.

More evidence that "legalistically structured" religion can produce neurosis came from Dr. Klaus Thomas, founder of Berlin's Suicide Prevention Center. At the Center, he said, about 40% of 3,000 suicide-prone patients suffered from "ecclesiogenic neurosis" arising from guilt feelings—especially about sex—induced by their religious training. The church needs a "theology of eroticism," he concluded, that would allow for what Luther called "sensuality governed by the Holy Spirit."

Neurotic faith is not just a laymen's problem. Dr. Leo H. Bartemeier of Baltimore's Seton Psychiatric Institute suggested that ministers should be "as free as possible from delusions about their own omnipotence." And the Rev. Edward S. Golden, secretary of the United Presbyterians' Inter-Board Office of Personnel Services, argued that "there is a crisis in health with moral, physical and emotional manifestations among American clergy." One sign of widespread disturbance among ministers, he noted, is that of the nation's 8,500 United Presbyterian clergymen on pastoral assignment, 3,000 want to leave their churches, while 1,200 congregations are dissatisfied with their current preacher.