Is faith purely emotional, or is it possible to provide a rational justification for religious belief? Is emotion a source of spiritual knowledge? If so, how can we justify discussing spiritual matters in public?

Belief - the mental act, condition, or habit of placing trust or confidence in another: My belief in you is as strong as ever.

faith - Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence.


you must fully understand the ideas behind faith and belief for this.

So it seems to me then that the paranoid schizophrenic who beleives he is Napoleon Bonaparte, in not basing this belief not logic, has very strong faith.

How then is it that we can distinguish the insane from the merely religious?

confusion arises when we conflate terms. 'Faith' is not synonymous with 'assumption'. Many people operate on 'assumptions' and in a probabilistic framework in order to maximize some thing or other. Such assumption-based thinking and operating is independent of 'faith'. What people seem to mean by 'faith' is blind acceptance of something as true without any reason or justification. As such, 'faith' really is synonymous is blindly believing in the 'truth' or reality of something, without being able to give good reasons for why they believe in it. 'Faith' is independent of 'determinism'; someone can blindly believe in things and yet be fully determined by natural events to do so. In other words, it is possible that some people are determined by nature to blindly believe in things, without their being able to give any reasons for why they believe in those things; though if these people understood the natural causes that gave rise to their 'faith', then they would understand the reasons for their 'faith', even if they are not able to provide rational arguments for the validity of the object to which one's 'faith' is directed towards.

For example, it is possible that there are natural causes resulting in some people having 'faith' in God even though they cannot provide justification for the object of their 'faith'; i.e, God. Thus, whether someone with 'faith' can justify his position or not does not invalidate the fact (or possibility) that there is a rational basis for the existence and development of said 'faith'.

Rationality is based on a sense of doubtfulness
Faith/belief/Trust is based on a sense of doubtlessness
(Some people might say that it is the other way)

These are two aspects of life, and a person can't just have one of them to be complete.

TYPICALLY, Rationality (sense of doubtfulness) leads to material progress and Faith/belief/Trust (sense of doubtlessness) leads to spiritual progress.

In Spiritual terms, everyone wants to reach the state of "doubtlessness".
A rational person first applies his "sense of doubtfulness" and then builds some logic to reach the "sense of doubtlessness"
A believer directly applies his "sense of doubtlessness"
From this perspective, looking for rationality, is obviously irrational.

Sanity is not black and white; it is a multidimensional gray scale.

When the "sense of doubtfulness" and "sense of doubtlessness" are in perfect balance, one reaches the highest point in the sanity gray scale.
Any tilt towards one of them brings a person down on the sanity gray scale.

We are NOT talking here about the object of doubtlessness; we are talking only about the "sense of doubtlessness".
Any object can subject to both the "sense of doubtfulness" and "sense of doubtlessness"

One should nurture equally, the "sense of doubtfulness" and "sense of doubtlessness".

Well put!!!!!!!!

Just to kep the discussion fueled, what about the following:

Religious faith is based on hope that something good might become of individuals and the human race through the intervention of some fictitious deity, rather than accept that we have to work ourselves for our survival, hopefully whilst being kind to one another as that makes good social survival sense. (Notwithstanding the possibility of other, superior(!), life in the universe that might intervene at some point and save us a lot of hard work).

Also, religious faith was inspired by clever ancients who told stories about nasty life after death if you did not lead a good conforming life, obey and worship them, and contribute to their coffers in the meantime, i.e. keeping the masses quite and taking their money. This has largely been replaced in the Western World by politicians who take us in with their pre-election blurb and then when in power, restrict us further with new laws and find ever more imaginative and invisible ways to take our money, as well as usually putting up taxes visibly under the pretext of some new war or world recession.

I would not blame anybody for what we are now.
Everyone carries a model of life and live according their model.
But the reality is ever changing and there is always a conflict between the reality and any model.

The essence of faith is to break all the models and go(rather flow) long with the reality.
Hence faith is not a blind belief; it is seeing the reality directly without any model.

A rationalist cannot see the reality directly and he needs a model. And he validates this model through logic. He sees the reality only through a logically validated model.
A blind believer also carries a model, but he does not validate it through logic. But he also sees the reality only through his model.

An enlightened person does not carry any model. Even if he does carry a model, he knows that it is only one aspect the reality and he does not see the reality through it.

A true spiritual leader knows that it is not easy for anyone to drop his model. Hence they tried to give such a model that, whoever carries them, would eventually slip into the reality. It is a different issue whether those models really help people to slip into the reality, or did they pull people away from reality. You can call them 'closer to reality' models, but they are still models.

I would not want to blame the poor politicians, especially in a democracy.
Democracy is the system where you let everyone else to decide what you will have. (Hence no one gets what he/she wants)
It has the advantage that it cannot become too bad. And it can never be too good also (Unless the majority of the population is enlightened).
For the lack of other options I guess we need to accept, for time being, current political system and politicians, as they are required for managing the day-to-day affairs. (Here I am referring only to democratic nations)
I, guess, Changes in individuals would eventually lead to better global governance.

This too is a very wise insight - has there been some kind of growth serum for the soul taken by the members of this forum (without my knowing)?

That MUST be it!