Unreasonable Doubt and the Fatherless

Here's an interesting excerpt from an article in "Christianity Today" on February 10, 2011.  The article, Unreasonable Doubt is by Jim Spiegel.

External factors may also hamper the natural awareness of God and contribute to a descent into atheism. In his book Faith of the Fatherless: The Psychology of Atheism, New York University psychologist Paul Vitz, a onetime atheist, examines the lives of the major atheists of the modern period, including Hobbes, Hume, Voltaire, Feuerbach, Nietzsche, Sartre, Camus, Russell, and Freud. He found they had something in common: a broken relationship with their father. Whether by death, departure, abuse, or some other factor, the father relationships of all these well-known atheists were defective. Vitz also examined the lives of prominent theists during the same period (Pascal, Reid, Burke, Berkeley, Paley, Wilberforce, Kierkegaard, Schleiermacher, Newman, Chesterton, and Bonhoeffer, among others). In every case, he found a good relationship with the father or at least a strong father figure.

Prescription for Right Now

Cast all your anxiety upon Him, for He cares for you.

- 1 Peter 5:7

I'm not sure who wrote this, but it fits right into my last blog on Peace:  

It is natural to be anxious when we are ill; but it is just as natural for the one who has love for God in his heart to turn all anxiety over to Him.  Let God do your worrying.  Even more than an earthly father loves his child, God cares for you.  Cast your anxiety on Him!  His shoulders are broad.

Prayer:  Father, if there is anxiety in my heart, out of Thy great love take it into Thine own heart and give to me that peace which passes all understanding, in the name of Thy Son.  Amen.