Here’s what Vitz writes on page 145:
“Since both believers and nonbelievers in God have psychological reasons for their positions, one important conclusion is that any debate as to the truth of the existence of God, psychology should be irrelevant. A genuine search for evidence supporting, or opposing, the existence of God should be based on the evidence and arguments found in philosophy, theology, science, history, and other relevant disciplines. It should also include an understanding of religious experience.
In one important sense, therefore, the present study is an argument in favor of the pre-modern idea that controversies should be settled on the basis of the evidence, not on the psychology of the interlocutors. In this framework, ad hominem arguments must be rejected as irrelevant- and psychological arguments are all ad hominem; that is, they address the person presenting the evidence and not the evidence itself.
On the other hand, in the actual, practical interaction between believers and unbelievers, the preceding study also supports a different conclusion. It seems clear from the kinds of evidence I have cited that many an intense personal ‘reason’ lies behind the public rejection of God. If one wishes to genuinely reach such people, one must address their underlying psychology. Aside from the common, superficial reasons, most serious unbelievers are likely to have painful memories underlying their rationalization of atheism. Such interior wounds are not irrelevant and need to be fully appreciated and addressed by believers.”
This seems absolutely sensible to me.
With regards to what he believes, he writes on page 15:
“I am well aware that there is good reason to give only limited acceptance to Freud’s Oedipal theory. In any case, it is my own view that, although the Oedipus complex is valid for some, the theory is far from a universal explanation of unconscious motivation. There is need, therefore, for a wider understanding of atheism, especially of the intense kind. Since I know of no theoretical framework other than the Oedipal one, I am forced to sketch something of a new model. But in fact I will develop an undeveloped thesis of Freud himself.”
He goes on to argue that his model does not rely on the assumptions that typically lead most of us to reject Freudian ideas. It’s a model based on Freud but without the metaphysical baggage we all rightly reject. So he doesn’t quite buy into Freud wholesale; it’s a model consistent with Freud but relies on the empirical evidence he sites rather than on the assumption that Freud’s entire psychological model is true.
