Agreed, there is something unique about church. Maybe the spiritual and emotional aspect is too intertwined to separate. It is very easy to confuse emotions (i.e. feeling good about something) with spirituality when the two are very different.
Arguably humanism was an intellectually-driven pursuit. So it never crossed the chasm.
Growing up in Manchester, I found it was football that fulfilled the emotional and tribal needs of many of my peers.
Many people assume Britain and USA are the same. In many respects, that is true. But as to church and religion, they are poles apart. At least that was true in the nineties when I lived in USA.
