Welcome to Autism Forums, a friendly forum to discuss Aspergers Syndrome, Autism, High Functioning Autism and related conditions.
Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:We hope to see you as a part of our community soon! Please also check us out @ https://www.twitter.com/aspiescentral
I am not an atheist I am a pagan...I am more Wiccan than anything else. But I think it is possible to have spirtuality rather than one thing to believe in. I don't know its just me.
I think Aspergers allows us to scrutinize the social aspect of things and deconstruct them to find our own place inside, finding no such a place for ourselves, we move on, sometimes leaving the pieces disassembled behind us.
The need to think we go on after death is integral to the higher beings because we deny ourselves so much in the moment, if we kept to our instinct and our natural drives we wouldn?t have roads or eat with utensils but we wouldn?t need god either, the animals don?t, they accept death.
I think Aspergers allows us to scrutinize the social aspect of things and deconstruct them to find our own place inside, finding no such a place for ourselves, we move on, sometimes leaving the pieces disassembled behind us.
Yes, I can relate to your analysis of how us Aspies deconstruct things. I'm always doing this in order to make sense of things. But I tend to keep going obsessively until I assemble a new construct.
I came across this article which suggests there's a link between autism and atheism because people with autism are less likely to be able to relate to a personal God. Do you guys go along with this? Are you a believer or not?
To answer the thread question: Yes. Definitely. I honestly get surprised when people on the spectrum admit to being anything other than atheist or agnostic as it's quite rare to find religious people in the ASD community. If I'd have to guess, I'd say that only 5% or less of people on the spectrum are religious.
I'm Agnostic.
Interesting variety of responses in this thread. I expected that since it's claimed a lot of scientists are Aspies, and that since science generally equates with atheism, that Aspies would be less likely to be religious.
I'd like to preface by saying I have not gotten an official Aspie diagnosis, only a self-suspicion at this juncture.
That being said, I have been a Christian since I was around 12. My family was "Baptist" in a very loose sense of the word. Both my parents claimed they were "overchurched" as children and we only attended as a family a handful of times. I did receive some religious education from my grandmother - she was always telling me stories and would take me to church when she visited. In middle school, my second friend of my entire life attended a church, so I decided to go with her. I continued attending church even when she did not although I admit it made me highly uncomfortable to be around all the people I didn't know. When I would visit my other grandmother and grandfather (not the one I mentioned before), we would go to their church. That church has been the closest thing to "my church" that I have. I know a few people there, even today, from my childhood so it's not as uncomfortable as some of the other places I have been. I am most uncomfortable in big churches and most comfortable in small churches. The best church I was in probably had thirty people total, so although I did have to periodically socialize, it wasn't as "scary" as at a large church where I didn't even know people's names (and even at this small church I found I tended to "hide" behind my daughter who was a baby at the time lol... everyone loves a baby!)
As far as the logic of church... I think probably at first I was trying to fit in. My mom said she felt I was "easily brainwashed" by the people I would interact with at church - to the degree of I used to have a ouija board and tarot cards and I burned them due to the influence at the time. I don't regret this decision in hindsight, but I can see how it could be seen as drastic. As time has passed, I have actually learned about God and the Bible, and have come to see it as truth. I have listened to radio programs that included segments of Christian Science (which I found fascinating!) After exposure to all this information it has become impossible for me to NOT see how God could be the truth. To me, it makes more logical sense that there is a Creator, then that the world just "magically" exploded and happened to exist exactly as it does in order for earth to survive. Things such as if the chemical composition of oxygen was 1% more the entire earth would explode in a ball of fire, and if it was 1% less then all of life would suffocate and die. (I may be off on the numbers but it was something to that effect). It's difficult to explain and I guess people would label under the blanket of "faith" but it really does just make sense to me. I can see how God has touched everything around me. I see the patterns of His work. When there are trials in my life, I notice that He has provided ways out (and my life has been FILLED with troubles!) As a quick (hopefully) personal example, there was a point in time when I was unemployed and a single mom and I HAD to get a job. I applied at lots of places and could not seem to find anything suitable. There were places that would interview me but did not seem like it would be conducive to my having a child (read: man-friendly work environments). Finally I did find one that I interviewed with and I just knew that that was the one. It sounds silly but it was almost as though I were being TOLD that this were the one (not audibly of course). It's a sense of anxiety. When I feel anxious about things, I have noticed it's not the "right" decision. When I feel peace about something, it has always turned out to be the right choice. If you are unfamiliar with the Bible it says something to this effect - that you find peace following God's will. Anyways, this is getting kind of long.
Point - I am a Christian, and if I eventually get diagnosed Aspie as well then chalk another up for a religious Aspie.
The only real way to know would be to get an accurate count of people who believe in God and the percentage of population, then find out the percentage of diagnosed people with asperger's who believe in God. I strongly suspect I have asperger's and have never 'clicked" with people the way I have with folks here on AC, but I wouldn't be elligable for the study. Regardless, I am a christian.
As to Dragon's Tooth's question- the word religion is defined in many different ways by different people. The word is too vague. For example, the Christian doctrines (as supported by the bible, not made up by a pope or theologean) prohibits going and slaughtering people and worshipping religious relics. However, that is just what happened during the crusades. So people will say, "See- look what religion does! It causes wars and death!" But what was really happening was that people who claimed to do these thing s in the name of Christ or Christianity were actually directly going against obvious teachings of Jesus and others from their own holy book. They didn't know their book- and their leaders used some random verses taken out of context and the abhorrent authority that church leaders held over the general population. See, the religion had been state-ized. The state should always stay out of religion because they will corrupt it. However, Thomas Jefferson himself said that the state should stay out of religion (in this case christianity) and not sanction one particular sect SO THAT christianity would always be free to inform free people on political decisions (a little American history there). I'm only mentioning this to point out what happened historically.
Of course, my words could spark endless debate from people who are atheists or subscribe to other religions. This is not my intent. My intent is only to point out that religion is a loaded word, because two debating parties are often defining it completely differently. I would reccomend Francis Schaffer's book How Shall We Then Live? For both sides of the debate for more information on the effect philosophy and "religion," and specifically christianity, has had on history if you are interested in an objective synopsis.
That said, I know diagnosed aspies who believe in God. I suspect the percentage is similar to that of the general population. I also disagree that "logic" automatically discredits faith, religion, or the supernatural. True science is that which is observable, testable, and repeatable. The big bang hypothesis and atheistic hypothesis of origins are none of these things. Both are thus in the same position as religion- one must take them entirely on faith. The evidence is nowhere. Just well developed ideas. Even my biology teacher, who fully subscribed to the idea that we had decended from apes, explained to us why the Theory of Evoloution doesn't even count as a theory because there isn't enough evidence- it is only a hypothesis. People still talk about "Lucy" even though it has been discreditied, and "Nebraska Man" even though it turned out to be a fictional character built entirely from what turned out to be the tooth of a wild boar, not a pre-human. So our decision is, then, where will we put our faith? All mankind is inherantly religious. We all have a belief system for which some parts have no hard evidence. And we all worship something- be it ourselves, leaders, nature, one of many gods, etc.