What the Mentally Disabled and Those With Neurological Disorders Tell Us About God's Plan

1. A Neurology of Disbelief
2. Atheists
3. Conclusion

1. A Neurology of Disbelief

Some mentally disabled people show a marked decline in religiosity. Others are too simple to understand the complexities of what is required of them for salvation. The very fact that many of these people are born with these disabilities must mean that 'correct belief' is not something God finds essential in an individual. There have been a series of modern sociological investigations into mental disease and religion.

“Researchers have blazed a trail. Patrick McNamara, for example, is the head of the Evolutionary Neurobehaviour Laboratory at Boston University's School of Medicine. He works with people who suffer from Parkinson's disease. This illness is caused by low levels of a messenger molecule called dopamine in certain parts of the brain. In a preliminary study, Dr McNamara discovered that those with Parkinson's had lower levels of religiosity than healthy individuals, and that the difference seemed to correlate with the disease's severity.”

The Economist (2008)₁

Psychologists have known for some time that some people are born with an apparent disinclination to be religious. William James noted in his 1902 Gifford Lectures that some people are naturally inclined towards certain religious experiences whilst others seem immune to them, not having the right physiological (or mental) equipment for those experiences₂. Two researchers, Spinella and Wain, concluded in 2006 that religious experiences frequently result from purely neurological abnormalities₃.

All mental disabilities exist on a scale, from the profound to the mild, to the unnoticeable. Wrong thinking is always partially inherited, as are traits such as gullibility and stubbornness. There is room here to imagine that members of the 'wrong' religion are merely mentally retarded. That is why god's obvious truths are lost on them. But this seeming victory for intolerant traditionalists turns out to be a Trojan horse: For if God creates people with inherent thinking problems and cognitive abnormalities, then it can't be true that such people are judged badly because of the way God made them in the first place. In fact, it seems the opposite must be true: Those who are born without the cognitive ability to understand holy truth must be judged by criteria other than their beliefs. If all people's beliefs are a result of their upbringing and environment as many sociologists believe, then it is probably true that people all over the world cannot help their own beliefs.

2. Atheists

About Atheism and types of atheists

Aside from people who come to have the wrong beliefs as the result of a clear pathology, there are those explicit atheists who understand the concept of God and even the details of theology, but who do not believe it. These are not the same class of non-believers as Implicit atheists who have never experienced God or been told about God: I.e., they have no conception of God and have therefore not rejected or accepted God. Explicit atheists think it is more likely that God does not exist. If there actually is a God that has revealed itself to man, then this inability to understand normal reality is still a form of intellectual disability, a disability of faith. If explicit atheists did not have this 'disability' then they would clearly perceive that God existed... that they do not think this is not a choice they make, it is a function of their inbuilt character and is probably out of their control.

3. Conclusion

Forms of mental retardation affect religiosity, and, cognitive and neurological abnormalities are related to religious experiences. Some people can never believe the 'right' things about God and salvation because it is beyond their cognitive capacity. Therefore God cannot judge people by their beliefs. This makes religion mostly pointless, as it is clearly not essential to have the right beliefs, otherwise God would not create people who have faulty (or missing) religious experiences. If God condemns people because of the intellectual or mental shortcomings that God gave them in the first place, then God is immoral. Earthly correct belief cannot be an essential requirement of salvation.

Universalism: If there is a Good God, Everyone Must Go to Heaven

The arguments on this page lend credence to Universalism because it shows a perfectly-good God would save everyone and send them to heaven no matter what beliefs they had during their lives.