Faith

Faith is necessary to progress in life whether it is faith in yourself, your significant other, in your body or mind working properly, in a religion you have chosen to believe in. Whatever it is no one can go on without faith in something unless someone is a baby  being cared for by a caregiver. 

In the early 1980s I met Chakdud Tulku (An enlightened Living Buddha Tibetan Lama and Tibetan Doctor) who then lived in Cottage Grove, Oregon. He was speaking to me about issues I was then dealing with in my life concerning faith and he told me about someone he knew that had attained Full enlightenment meditating on a tooth he believed was a tooth of Gautama Buddha. However, after attaining full enlightenment later in this Master's life he had the tooth analyzed by medical technician's and was told it was a dog's tooth and therefore couldn't be the tooth of Gautama Buddha. At this we all laughed. But the point of all this is that it isn't as much of a problem of what you have faith in as long as it works for you to go on and "Become Enlightened" in your life so you are an asset to yourself and all life on earth and beyond. So, no matter your religion or belief system just remember you need to believe in something even if it is yourself, or nature or a philosophy. Believing in something if your motivation if pure and correct will take you to enlightenment no matter what that means in your system of beliefs. So, though beliefs for many people center around God or nature, just remember that the important thing is everyone  needs to believe in something or someone even if it is only believing in yourself.