Religion made the terrible mistake when it consigned the body to the "lower" physical world while the soul was lifted to the "higher" spiritual realm. A functioning soul is not so different from a functioning body. Both are involved in the same things - awareness and energy - that make life possible. "I am my body" and "I am my soul" are two faces of the same truth. The problem is that we have lost contact with the soul. It wasn't created to be useless, we made it that way.