Religion as a mental illness

[Cephus]

But that makes no sense whatsoever.  "Normal" and "common" are not synonyms.  If you had a society where chopping off people's arms was commonplace, would you consider that to be normal?  Is it healthy behavior?  Or is that unhealthy?  If the point of psychology is to make everyone just like everyone else, without an objective baseline, then what use is it?

The point is what is the underlying brain function that is giving rise to the behavior.  While there may be societies where adolescents undergo horrific rites of passage, the commonality seems to imply that there is nothing wrong with the brain that is causing the behavior.

There's actually got to be more to it than "do you have a screwed up brain we can medicate".  There are psychological problems that require counseling, not medication.