Intimacy with God, Theory of Mind, and Absorption: The Role of Mentalizing and Imagination in Religious Experience

Mentalizing may be one of the cognitive foundations of religious belief. Researchers hypothesize that mentalizing will be related to levels of mysticism and absorption, which will mediate the relationship of mentalizing with prayer intimacy, experience of god(s) and agentic evil (the devil), and belief in supernatural agents.