For The Love of God : Narcissists and Religion

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“1 But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: 2 For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful unholy, 3 unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, 4 traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away! 6 For of this sort are those who creep into households and make captives of gullible women loaded down with sins, led away by various lusts, 7 always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. 8 Now as Jan’nes and Jam’bres resisted Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, disapproved concerning the faith; 9 but they will progress no further, for their folly will be manifest to all, as theirs also was.”

By Sam Vaknin Author of “Malignant Self-love: Narcissism Revisited”

(The Second Epistle of Paul the Apostle to Timothy 3:1-9)

God is everything the narcissist ever wants to be: omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, admired, much discussed, and awe inspiring. God is the narcissist’s wet dream, his ultimate grandiose fantasy. But God comes handy in other ways as well.

charles Rich wrote:God is everything the narcissist ever wants to be: omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, admired, much discussed, and awe inspiring. God is the narcissist’s wet dream, his ultimate grandiose fantasy.

Indeed, this is quite the truth. As for religion, I've expressed my stance in one thread before:

As for religion and specifically Christianity, I've never been religious and educated myself quite early on this subject. However, the very first thing I disliked about the idea of a God is not the lack of scientific evidence, proof of its existence or ridiculous amounts of empathic tricks on the masses using this weak philosophy of religion - and all of these I've mentioned already stink pretty badly, don't they? - but the fact, that there is some kind of an authority that I should be kneeling to. I found it absolutely silly from the beginning as a child and this is expressed beautifully in the quote somewhere above by Stirner. (http://www.lsr-projekt.de/poly/enee.html - All Things Are Nothing To Me - the full excerpt of my quote) Paradoxically, my subjectivity lead me to objectivity and a choice - be the God for myself, despite the circumstances. It doesn't mean being a fundamental atheist of some sort - no, not at all. If, for instance, Christian God would be proven by scientific measures, I would surely accept the fact that it is there. But to accept its authority? I am fully capable of being grandeur in selfishness myself.

Speaking of Gods, the only one that I like from all literature and mythology is Odin. God who loves warfare and death and calls it poetry. After all, death is pretty real, isn't it?

Sigurd wrote:

charles Rich wrote:God is everything the narcissist ever wants to be: omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, admired, much discussed, and awe inspiring. God is the narcissist’s wet dream, his ultimate grandiose fantasy.

Indeed, this is quite the truth. As for religion, I've expressed my stance in one thread before:

As for religion and specifically Christianity, I've never been religious and educated myself quite early on this subject. However, the very first thing I disliked about the idea of a God is not the lack of scientific evidence, proof of its existence or ridiculous amounts of empathic tricks on the masses using this weak philosophy of religion - and all of these I've mentioned already stink pretty badly, don't they? - but the fact, that there is some kind of an authority that I should be kneeling to. I found it absolutely silly from the beginning as a child and this is expressed beautifully in the quote somewhere above by Stirner. (http://www.lsr-projekt.de/poly/enee.html - All Things Are Nothing To Me - the full excerpt of my quote) Paradoxically, my subjectivity lead me to objectivity and a choice - be the God for myself, despite the circumstances. It doesn't mean being a fundamental atheist of some sort - no, not at all. If, for instance, Christian God would be proven by scientific measures, I would surely accept the fact that it is there. But to accept its authority? I am fully capable of being grandeur in selfishness myself.

Speaking of Gods, the only one that I like from all literature and mythology is Odin. God who loves warfare and death and calls it poetry. After all, death is pretty real, isn't it?

And who loved knowledge:-)

Most certainly.

Sigurd wrote:Most certainly.

§hould have been Odin then and not Sigurd

Ah, well. Sigmund and Sigurd are pretty neat, too. You can't deny - blessed by Odin, aren't they.

Sigurd wrote:Ah, well. Sigmund and Sigurd are pretty neat, too. You can't deny - blessed by Odin, aren't they.

True....my faves of that are Odin and Thor. I read about that about 10 or so years ago. Forgotten much. Maybe I should start reading again..

As I got older I grew to see gods as reflections of humanity. Waking up to narcissism has put an interesting spin on a lot of religious literature.

How do you think religion relates to superstition?

One of the two Ns I know is highly superstitious - which I never understood. Superstition seems to me to be a very irrational objective "weakness" - the kind of thing an N would despise?

Any thoughts on this?

Superstition doesn't have to primarily strive from narcissism. I am not superstitious and I see it as an amusing weakness, just as much as a coping mechanism as religion. Few weeks ago, a relative of mine - in fact, my mother - gave me a red string to wear on my wrist which, supposedly, keeps you safe from the "bad glares" - envy, evil intentions, bad talks, etc. - as, as she inclined, I am a pure material for others' envy. I let her put it on me and researched this business about the red string and could not understand; dumbfounded and amused by this affair I was. After a few minutes it started to burn my wrist, so I clipped it and took it off, to her disappointment. I found it funny - this burning. As if she would put a cross on me and it would pain me to wear it.

However, one could say that I am symbolistic. First of all - to myself. I am a walking compilation of self created (with a few exceptions) symbolistic attachments representing different parts of myself. My lack of empathy leaves me to create intellectual value, which also comes with symbolism and almost beautifully artificial feelings attached to it.