"Superstition," to me, boils down to trivial habit. Throwing spilled salt over your shoulder, etc.
Faith, otoh, has the power to transform lives, be it religious or otherwise. Religion reflects our deepest-held values, expresses our hopes and dreams, and reveals depths of our collective psyche normally hidden.
To dismiss these things as mere superstition is incomprehensible to me.
So, how do you understand the words?
It would certainly be a mistake to equate the practice of throwing salt over one's shoulder to the practice of religion.
However, the problem I have with the way you describe "faith" is that this description seems to suggest that faith is inherently a good thing. Consider the crusaders who dropped to their knees and wept when they beheld Jerusalem; the parents who scarred their children emotionally to rid them of demons; the cultists who smiled and celebrated as they offered human sacrifices or drank the cool-ade in order to reach heavenly bliss. For these people, too, religion reflects their "deepest-held values, expresses [their] hopes and dreams, and reveals the depths of our collective psyche".
At the end of the day faith is basically a commitment to a spiritual ideology. Like a commitment to any ideology, this is neutral in itself. It only becomes a "good" thing when people are committed to a "good" ideology. When people are enthusiastic and cheering and raising banners in support of tolerance and free speech, I consider their enthusiasm good; when they're waving swastikas and cheering for the Fuhrer, it's bad. The unique problem with faith is that even when people are committed to a "good" spirituality, they are usually committed for bad reasons when there are good reasons available.
Storm said:
If you're in the habit of equating superstition with religion/ faith, why do you do so?
I wouldn't equate religion with throwing salt over one's shoulder. That would be absurd. But I do sometimes call religion superstition. This is simply because I do not deliberately avoid calling religion superstition.
I have two basic reasons for this. First: because I perceive this as accurate. Here's the definition of superstition from dictionary.com:
–noun
1. a belief or notion, not based on reason or knowledge, in or of the ominous significance of a particular thing, circumstance, occurrence, proceeding, or the like.
2. a system or collection of such beliefs.
3. a custom or act based on such a belief.
4. irrational fear of what is unknown or mysterious, esp. in connection with religion.
5.any blindly accepted belief or notion.
Second: from a historical perspective, many people are accustomed to referring to the "superstition" of the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Aztecs, Gauls, etc. This is acceptable terminology and people generally know what this means. Of course these ancient religions were more advanced than simple habits such as throwing salt over one's shoulder. But they are rightly called superstitions because, as we all recognize today, the mystical experiences, the visions, the "deepest held values" etc. came out of people's heads, not from demons or gods or other worlds. I choose not to grant special status to the superstitions which happened to have endured the chances of history. Therefore, I do not avoid calling Christianity, Islam, etc. "superstition" since, in the eyes of history and science, the religions of today will be the superstitions of tomorrow. It's unwarranted to make some special distinction between Roman paganism and the Catholic Church, as if the world was somehow destined to ponder the legitimate mysteries of the Trinity, but the mystical properties of the dodecahedron celebrated by the neo-Platonists were rightly disregarded as "superstitious" nonsense. Referring to modern-day religions as superstitions is a reminder to consider the long perspective of science and history; and also, to consider how complex and persuasive the ancient religions were.
