Why exactly is faith a cardinal virtue? Who decided it would be so? I have no faith, especially not in God, and yet I am very fulfilled. I am also very self-confident, but there's no faith. I say that I, or anyone, can be "divine" without God.

When you say faith precedes experience, you're in effect saying that if you condition yourself to look at the world in a certain way, then you'll see what you WANT to see in your experiences. I believe the complete opposite, I only have faith in what I experience, what I see, hear, taste, smell and touch. Faith in anything else is superfluous, useless and, I think, ultimately harmful.