Faith and doubt …

… The devout sceptic: hope for those of little faith | Standpoint. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

This is indeed what faith in its purest form means, for faith is not an intellectual conclusion to the sifting of evidence following a quasi-scientific inquiry. In the epistle-writer’s paradox, it is “the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen”; it is no more or less rigorous than atheism, in that both are assumptions that reflect the adherent’s pre-existing inclination, and require the acceptance of what can only be supposed. In the case of the religiously inclined, the resulting state of mind is one of trust, one that is open to mystery (an anathematic term to materialists), and one that does not object to practising a faith of which unknowing is the heart. The person who follows this path may find that, compared with others who take a more historically conventional approach, he believes more and more in less and less, but also that this progression represents an enhancement, not a diminution of faith. 

And there is this, from Jeremy Taylor:  “No man can hinder our private addresses to God; every man can build a chapel in his breast, himself the priest, his heart the sacrifice, and the earth he treads on, the altar.“