Is one man`s superstiton another man`s religion?

Superstition (Classical Latin superstitio, literally \"a standing over\", hence: \"amazement, wonder, dread, especially of the divine or supernatural\") is a belief or notion, not based on reason or knowledge. The word is often used pejoratively to refer to folk beliefs deemed irrational. This leads to some superstitions being called \"old wives' tales\". It is also commonly applied to beliefs and practices surrounding luck, prophecy and spiritual beings, particularly the irrational belief that future events can be influenced or foretold by specific unrelated prior events.

The Latin word is attested in the 1st century BC, notably in Cicero, Livy, Ovid, in the meaning of an unreasonable or excessive belief in fear or magic, especially foreign or fantastical ideas. By the 1st century AD, it came to refer to \"religious awe, sanctity; a religious rite\" more generally.

In keeping with the Latin etymology of the word, religious believers have often seen other religions as superstition. Likewise, atheists and agnostics may regard religious belief as superstition.

Religious practices are most likely to be labeled \"superstitious\" by outsiders when they include belief in extraordinary events (miracles), an afterlife, supernatural interventions, apparitions or the efficacy of prayer, charms, incantations, the meaningfulness of omens, and prognostications.

Greek and Roman pagans, who modeled their relations with the gods on political and social terms, scorned the man who constantly trembled with fear at the thought of the gods, as a slave feared a cruel and capricious master. \"Such fear of the gods (deisidaimonia) was what the Romans meant by 'superstition'. For Christians just such fears might be worn proudly as a name: Desdemona.

The Roman Catholic Church considers superstition to be sinful in the sense that it denotes a lack of trust in the divine providence of God and, as such, is a violation of the first of the Ten Commandments. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states superstition \"in some sense represents a perverse excess of religion\".

The Catechism clearly dispels commonly held preconceptions or misunderstandings about Catholic doctrine relating to superstitious practices:

Superstition is a deviation of religious feeling and of the practices this feeling imposes. It can even affect the worship we offer the true God, e.g., when one attributes an importance in some way magical to certain practices otherwise lawful or necessary. To attribute the efficacy of prayers or of sacramental signs to their mere external performance, apart from the interior dispositions that they demand is to fall into superstition. Cf. Matthew 23:16-22

Some superstitions originated as religious practices that continued to be observed by people who no longer adhere to the religion that gave birth to the practice. Often the practices lost their original meaning in this process. In other cases, the practices are adapted to the current religion of the practicer. As an example, during the Christianizing of Europe, pagan symbols to ward off evil were replaced with the Christian cross.

It being Friday the 13th, I thought this would be a fun thread to bump up.

Superstitions.

Any thoughts?