Hi nwr,
I do agree with your assessment. I think we too often look to science as a method to discover truth, but really science is all about utility. That's one of the major reasons why we have Occam's Razor.
I think there's one thing that you didn't mention, but that is implied by your post. I hope it's not far off topic to mention it, but I'll give it a shot and see what you think.
I think the door swings both ways. Just like science, religious belief and faith need not be "true" or "false", "right" or "wrong". What really matters in faith is how it affects you, how it changes you, and how you live your life because of it. In other words, it is the utility of faith that really has meaning. Whether any article is actually true? It never really mattered.
It's like Dumbo and his feather.
In this way then, I see science and faith similar. They are both misconstrued as avenues to "truth". But all that ever really mattered was how we treat each other. The only thing that ever made "truth" matter was our own pointless, made-up ideal.
Fortunately, that ideal turned out to be useful... sometimes.
Ben
P.S. Why do I feel like this post could have been written by brennakimi?