Autistic children not atheists, go directly to heaven: Foundation head

İZMİR – Doğan News Agency

Burhan Özfatura (L), head of the Anatolia Autism Foundation, was also a renown politican during the 80s and 90s having served as mayor of İzmir. DHA photo

All children with Down syndrome will directly go to heaven according to Islam, the director of an autism foundation said April 24, a few days after another association head caused fury by likening autistic children to atheists.

“Someone with very basic religious knowledge knows that there is a concept called ‘pubescent intelligence.’ In other words, the condition that the mind reaches a determined level is sought. All these children will directly go to heaven, according to the Islamic faith,” the head of the Anatolia Autism Foundation, Burhan Özfatura, said during a partnership protocol between the association and Aegean University in İzmir.

The head of Adana Health and Education Associations for Autistic Children, sociologist Fehmi Kaya, had claimed over the weekend that “Autistic children do not know how to believe in God because they do not have a section for faith in their brains.” “Autistic children are atheists due to a lack of a section for faith in their brains,” Kaya said, reportedly adding that atheism was also a form of autism. 

Özfatura, a former politician who served twice as mayor of İzmir, said Kaya’s remarks could not be taken seriously. “We don’t want to popularize [Kaya] more than that. If they take the most basic manual of Islamic faith and read it, they will see that it in detail,” he said. 

Özfatura emphasized that only one in 200 autistic children in Turkey was receiving scientific treatment and education, adding that their partnership with a major university of İzmir was important. “The genetics unit [of Aegean University] is sufficient for meeting the demands. Our goal is to spread the experiences that we will reach here. We will send every mayor in Turkey documents as recommendations for dealing with the children in their municipality,” he said. The program will start providing education to 40 autistic children this year. The project aims to create an education campus for 700 children.