What is man that thou art mindful of him,
and the son of man that thou dost care for him? - Psalm 8:4
What is man?
We have physical bodies. But there is more to us that that.
Look at the animal kingdom. They move with purpose and have active lives but has any species done anything like man? Where are the roads, houses, buildings, computers, rockets, TVs or anything that represents development on the scale of man in any of the other animals on earth?
So why are we different?
Our intelligence and will make the difference. These powers make us capable of non-physical activity.
Self awareness and the power of abstraction to form concepts are spiritual - non physical - activities. Yes, there are physical processes in our brain that facilitate our thinking but they are not the cause of our thinking. The material does not fully account for the non-material activity in us.
The part of us responsible for non-material activity we call the ‘soul’.
Have you noticed that nature always fulfills natural tendencies or appetites?
Our natural appetites serve a sound purpose. We get hungry and thirsty so that we will take food and stay healthy. We get tired so we will sleep and recuperate. We are attracted to the opposite sex so we reproduce and the species survives.
Just as hunger is the expression of an innate urge for self preservation, so the urge to honour God comes from the depths of the human psyche. We are just made that way.
Sociologists have never discovered a human society that does not reference a higher power. This reflects the fact that every human being is naturally religious.
With an honest heart and a clear mind, any enquirer can come to an understanding that a higher power than man exists. That much can be determined by human reason.
But if a higher power exists, what does that mean for me? That is the question religion explores.