Psychology of Atheism

For as long as atheism has existed as a significant intellectual movement, there have been attempts by atheists to psychoanalyze religious belief – to explain it or explain it away not with regards to its inherent truth or falsehood, but rather in terms of psychological needs, as wish-fulfillment for comfort or security or purpose. While psychological research into the factors which may make belief in God more or less likely is legitimate in itself, psychological accounts of religious belief are all too often used as disingenuous rhetorical ploys which allow atheists to conveniently dismiss religion on an intellectual level.

The predominant assumption, effectively put to use by the so-called New Atheists, is that religious belief is based on psychological and emotional needs whereas the rejection of God is based on rational principle. But what if the same theories used to explain religious belief could be turned around to explain atheism? What if it could be shown that, while atheists claim that people believe in God because they need God to exist, the opposite is actually true – that many atheists reject the idea of God, sometimes violently, because they have a deep desire for God not to exist?