If the truth of religious doctrines is dependent on an inner experience that bears witness to the truth, what is one to make of the many people who do not have that experience?
Sigmund FreudI cannot think of any need in childhood as strong as the need for a father's protection.
Sigmund FreudReligion restricts the play of choice and adaptation, since it imposes equally on everyone its own path to the acquisition of happiness and protection from suffering. Its technique consists in depressing the value of life and distorting the picture of the real world in a delusional manner - which presupposes an intimidation of the intelligence. At this price, by forcibly fixing them in a state of psychical infantilism and by drawing them into a mass-delusion, religion succeeds in sparing many people an individual neurosis. But hardly anything more.
Sigmund FreudCivilized society is perpetually menaced with disintegration through this primary hostility of men towards one another.
Sigmund Freud