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The jibe reflects the teachings of Sigmund Freud; that belief in God is nothing more than wish fulfillment, a projection of a childish need for security.

But now a psychologist is turning the tables on Freud's followers. It turns out that Freud's teachings were based not on psychoanalytical evidence, but on his personal hostility towards religion.

What do Dietrich Bonhoffer, Albert Schweitzer, and
G.K. Chesterton have in common?

All of them were prominent Christians of the last
century. But these champions of our Heavenly Father
had something else in common, as well: All had
exceptionally close relationships with their
earthly fathers.

In his new book, Faith of the Fatherless,
psychologist Paul Vitz says he initially set out to
examine the lives of prominent atheists of the last
four centuries. He discovered that all had fathers
who were weak, abusive, missing, or dead. But then
he began to wonder: Was it possible that what appears
to modern eyes to be defective fathering simply
reflected the social conditions of the time?

To find the answer, Vitz compared the family
conditions of prominent atheists to those of
prominent theists from the same period. What he
found is startling: Every theist he studied had a
strong and tender bond with his father, or with a
father substitute. And as adults, these men became
known for taking on the intellectual forces of
atheism.

For example, Blaise Pascal, the great French
philosopher and mathematician, was home-schooled by
his Catholic father. Their relationship was close
and affectionate. As an adult, Vitz writes, Pascal
wrote "a powerful and imaginative defense of
Christianity."

John Henry Newman, the Catholic cardinal, also had a
life-long, loving relationship with his father. Vitz
notes that Newman developed a "clear and critical
understanding of modernism," and wrote rational
responses to it.

Alexis de Tocqueville, French aristocrat and
author of Democracy in America, loved his father
deeply. Tocqueville argued that religion is
absolutely necessary in the public life of a nation--
a view that was, Vitz writes, "really quite unusual"
at a time when atheistic views of culture "were
becoming standard in Europe."

William Wilberforce is known as Britain's great
Christian abolitionist, but few people know he was
also a devoted dad. When his son Samuel was away
at school, Wilberforce found time to write him
more than 600 letters in which he poured out his
love. Samuel later became a bishop who was
"well-known as one of the major debaters in the
conflict . . . over Darwinian evolutionary
theory," Vitz writes.

G.K. Chesterton, the Christian apologist, was deeply
attached to his father, who was Chesterton's constant
companion when he was a child.

Dietrich Bonhoffer, the German theologian who was executed by Hitler, also came from a loving home. His father was a major presence in the lives of his children, whom he treated with respect and affection, Vitz writes.

The great missionary to Africa, Albert Schweitzer, called his father "my dearest friend." Karl Barth, the Swiss-German theologian, also enjoyed a close relationship with his father.

In light of Vitz's research, the importance of good fathering can hardly be overstated. His book helps us understand why scripture commands fathers to provide diligent spiritual leadership to their children -- and why, in Ephesians, fathers are specifically instructed to avoid provoking their children to anger.