The blurry line between religious and crazy

At what point do we determine religious notions go from harmless beliefs to harmful problems (edit: maybe not harmful problems, per se, but behavior indicative of a problem) even when no one is actually harmed? How do we make a distinction between "crazy talk" and mere faithful devotion? Abraham would, I should hope, be locked away if he pulled his stunt nowadays. Yet, here we have millions of people that laud him for it, many claiming it to be the beacon of devotion and faith. Something to strive for, even.I ask this based on a recent story about a college football player that left the NFL combine because god told him to. He returned 3 days later and it was discovered that he spent those 3 days in the airport because he claims god told him to just sit there. Prospect leaves Scouting Combine, says God told him to
Combine departure has people close to Adam Muema concerned
Missing running back Adam Muema resurfaces
The consensus (fan opinions on message boards) is that this is crazy behavior. Behavior of someone needing help. But sports culture is rife with religious belief. Tim tebow is a very recent example of where a players relgiocity is praised. Hell, he had an anti abortion commercial during the Super Bowl last year. No one thinks anything wrong with him other than being kinda strange. Reggie White made it no secret that god told him to play football. Again, not crazy. (note: I use fan perspective because it is not clinical diagnosis I am looking for, but public perception and how we as society should want to view this subject)I don't want this to focus on sports, it just seemed like a good catalyst because it is a culture where heavy religiosity is expected and praised and "god told me X" or "god gave me this gift" is brushed off most of the time. It is far too easy as an atheist to say it is all crazy talk, but that doesn't do much good as far as the bigger picture goes and as far as advancing any discussion with non like-minded people. Social Issues and Creation/Evolution seems like the obvious choice.Edited by hooah212002, : No reason given.Edited by hooah212002, : I can't for the life of me word that first sentence the way I want

Right there in the article(s) it says that he did go to the combine, but left because god told him to. Yes, it IS ultimately harmless. But at what point do we use these sorts of actions to indicate mental health problems? Is it ok to be crazy as a shit house rat as long as you talk about one of the publicly accepted gods? If he said it was Zeus talking to him, does that change anything?There is another football example that comes to mind. Michael Sam: the first openly homosexual high profile athlete and potentially the first openly gay NFL athlete, depending on if he gets drafted. If this same person that I mentioned in my OP left the combine because god told him he didn't want him being around a homosexual, would you still feel as though he was making a sound decision free from criticism? Would he be justified in his rationale? I mean, it's just his harmless belief, right? Faith is a-ok in her beliefs (AZ thread) because god said so, right?(note: I am not calling into question ones right to have these beliefs. Instead, looking at how we as a (hopefully) enlightened society view them. You liberal christians are supposed to be joining enlightened society, aren't you?) Again, my intended direction of the discussion is not about how we, or you, feel about this particular individual or instance, but about where we draw the line between harmless belief and crazy talk. The first line of my post says exactly this. Except it is very real consequence and NOT "just sports". The amount of dedication one would have already put in to get himself to the NFL combine means it is no longer "just a sport" and now a career choice. That would be like saying professional programmers "just fart around on computers" while participating in an internship. I think you've missed the point entirely. I used this example because (as I already said), sports is a culture that looks past this sort of behavior most of the time but in this case it is viewed as irrational behavior. What makes that distinction? We have political representatives that say similar things daily and no one (except atheists) bats an eye. What does it take for the moderately religious to finally say "ok, you're nuts" when someone claims god talks to them? Or do you honestly think it is normal for someone to talk to god or have god talk to them? Was GW not applauded for saying god told him to invade Iraq? If you're asking me, I say crazy on both accounts. Delusional, even. But I am a bias party since I think they are looney just for believing a god exists in the first place.