Freuds view on religion

What is Freud's view on religion?
Sigmund Freud was an Austrian psychologist, born May 1953 and died September 1939 aged 83. He had a very Jewish upbringing, yet considered himself to be an atheist, and his later works showed that he considered religion to be a type of neurosis.
At various points in his work, Freud suggests that religion is an attempt to subdue or control what is known as the Oedipus complex; a father-son mental sexual competition over the mother. This suggests that the son feels a sexual desire towards his mother, and would be willing to kill his own father in order to have possession of his mother. Freud then links this to religion, saying that it is a neurosis that attempts to subdue this motive and push it into the unconscious mind.
Freud also links religion to OCD behaviour. For example, many people who suffer from having an obsessive compulsive disorder have to be organised in specific ways, (e.g. DVD’s on a shelf in alphabetical order), and this can be linked to some religious examples, such as in Islamic tradition, the Qur’an must be kept in the highest place possible in a house, such as at the top of bookshelves. As well as this, the reader should always sit facing Mecca, another example of OCD behaviour in religion.
Another of Freud’s views on religion is that it has been sexualised by people; particularly shown in the “Judge Schreber” case. According to Schreber, God communicated to him as he was a “plaything of devils”, and that he could save the world by turning into a woman. His belief was that God only had this relationship with certain individuals, and described it in sexual terms – for example, Schreber described one experience as “divine nerves entering his body like semen”. Freud viewed this as an oppression of homosexual desires, and that this also linked to the Oedipus complex, as Schreber had a “critical response” to his own father.
In regards to Freud’s view of religion as being a neurosis, Carl Jung commented in a completely different tone, stating that religion contributes positively towards mental health, particularly on a more spiritual level, and that God is not an image based on oppression but rather more self-realisation.
In conclusion, Sigmund Freud did not have a particularly positive opinion on religion, particularly viewing it as a neurosis that limits people by keeping them helpless and infantile, depriving them from having a “real” life. As well as this, Freud again links the idea of God to the Oedipus complex, viewing God as being father-feared; however this fear is projected into worship of God.