| | Vitz criticizes [[liberalism]] and believes there is a link between fatherlessness and atheism, as he demonstrates in his book ''Faith of the Fatherless, the Psychology of [[Atheism]]'' (1999). The thesis of ''Faith of the Fatherless'' holds that famous believers—e.g., [[Blaise Pascal]], [[Edmund Burke]], [[Friedrich Schleiermacher]], [[Karl Barth]], and [[Dietrich Bonhoeffer]]—had strong and loving fathers, whereas their atheistic counterparts—e.g., [[Thomas Hobbes]], [[Voltaire]], [[Sigmund Freud]], [[Mao Zedong]] and [[Adolf Hitler]]—all had fathers who were weak, unloving, or absent. Thus, philosophers, professors, and political tyrants who denounce God do so in order to relive traumatic childhood experiences and to subconsciously seek out help rather than to explore any sort of valid or respectable reasoning process. | | Vitz criticizes [[liberalism]] and believes there is a link between fatherlessness and atheism, as he demonstrates in his book ''Faith of the Fatherless, the Psychology of [[Atheism]]'' (1999). The thesis of ''Faith of the Fatherless'' holds that famous believers—e.g., [[Blaise Pascal]], [[Edmund Burke]], [[Friedrich Schleiermacher]], [[Karl Barth]], and [[Dietrich Bonhoeffer]]—had strong and loving fathers, whereas their atheistic counterparts—e.g., [[Thomas Hobbes]], [[Voltaire]], [[Sigmund Freud]], [[Mao Zedong]] and [[Adolf Hitler]]—all had fathers who were weak, unloving, or absent. Thus, philosophers, professors, and political tyrants who denounce God do so in order to relive traumatic childhood experiences and to subconsciously seek out help rather than to explore any sort of valid or respectable reasoning process. |
| | Frank L. Pasquale disputes the theory that absent/weak fathers are a causal factor of atheism in his journal article ''An Assessment of the Role of Early Parental Loss in the Adoption of Atheism or Irreligion'' (See: [[Atheism and poor relationships with parents]]). | | Frank L. Pasquale disputes the theory that absent/weak fathers are a causal factor of atheism in his journal article ''An Assessment of the Role of Early Parental Loss in the Adoption of Atheism or Irreligion'' (See: [[Atheism and poor relationships with parents]]). |