(Don’t be alarmed, scientists are not studying feelings, they are only studying emotions, divorced from cognition, as they travel in recognizable systems throughout the brain and the body.)

Philosophy, rhetoric, and literature -- until recently at least equal to science in prestige -- were once careful students of feelings.

Given Ruefle's definition, faith is a feeling. So is love. So are each of Haidt's moral foundations:

Care/harm for others
Fairness/cheating, Justice or Proportionality
Liberty/oppression
Loyalty/betrayal
Authority/Subversion or Respect
Sanctity/degradation or Purity

 Each of these characteristics can be traced to emotion.  But all are expressed in a particular context by specific persons in reference to their understanding of others: their feelings about a situation, issue, or person.

I am alarmed we do not give feelings the careful and critical attention they once received.