Should belief in faith healing be illegal?

We don't need anyone that dumb anyway. Let 'em kill themselves.

Just pray for the family that's all

Not illegal for yourself. If you have cancer no one can make you get treatment.
But if someone in your care (like a child or a sibling) is sick and needs treatment, it should be illegal to deny them that because of your personal beliefs.

But what to do with those who believe "God" is going to elect Mitten Romney to "heal" the economy? That too should be illegal, but insanity is sometimes difficult to define and even more difficult to prove.

1st Amendment Rights

Belief is no business of the government.
CLAIMS of faith healing should be regulated the same way drugs are. If a faith healer can support their claims with significant, double blind trials, then more power to them.

That, of course, will never happen.

That doesn't mean parents can abandon the medical attention for their kids.

But the question asked about Faith -- not actions.

faith precedes action. We act upon what we really believe. If we believe our house is on fire, we will get out, not just talk about it.

This is for many a freedom of religion issue and protected by the Constitution. Many times it has been upheld. In some rare cases it has been pierced by legal argument in order to save minor children.

Of course the mere belief shouldn't be illegal, but it should be illegal to not obtain proper medical care for a sick child. If the child was visibly ill and the faith healer went ahead with his performance instead of insisting that the parents go see a real doctor, he should be punished as well.

Most people, no matter how religious they might be, are sane enough to figure out if somebody needs real medical help. If someone has a heart attack, their first reaction is not to kneel down and pray, but to call an ambulance. The few nutcases who would completely rely on prayer or laying of hands or whatever in such a situation are unfit to take care of children, imho.

if they believe in faith healing, then they won't get medical attention. Or they don't really believe in faith healing.

See, that's the thing. Very few people really, truly believe in something like this. It's more like a strong hope, or perhaps greatly diminished skepticism.

Deep down we're all skeptics, and we have a very strong survival instinct. People might go to a faith healther, aura aligner or homeopath if they have a migraine or if their hay fever is bothering them. But they wouldn't call a reflexologist, TCM practicioner or voodoo doctor to treat something serious like pneumonia. Except for a small handful of really faithful people, that is.

If we're completely honest with ourselves, we have to acknowledge that these few people are not really sane and might be a danger to their children. They remind me of the saying "If you talk to God, you're religious, but if God talks back, you're psychotic." In this case, one might say "if you hope that a faith healer can ease your arthritis, you have an open mind (or very bad arthritis). But if you trust a faith healer to treat an appendicitis, you're delusional".

They can believe what they want. But when their delusion costs someone his/her life, they must be slammed with the full force of the law.

In fact not even the practice. However they should be required by law to also use more tangible means of healing, IE modern medicine, for thier children.