But even that doesn’t prove anything especially if they were truly benevolent why wouldn’t they reveal themselves?
Pagan gods do? I mean it's all biology/psychology but with plurality still intact instincts can self-portrait as archetypes, thereby more strongly influencing adaptation, seen either in dreams, visions, or projected out onto the world, also other people. The difference to ancestral cults (correctly understood) is merely sorting genetic knowledge (or better put expectations of the world) into categories so it's easier to spot. Read Freud for the basal instincts, Adler for the social ones, Jung for the actualising ones. Also, Panksepp.
Also, Thor exists. Proof: Christian churches have lightning rods.
Oh, thinking of it, that stuff is the one big truth contained in Christianity: The personal god / the priesthood of all believers. The rest is just fucking confused. Meister Eckhart definitely had something but it's kinda like Buddha trying to teach while avoiding getting burned at the stake so the conceptual framework is rather impenetrable as everything had to be cast into pre-existing doctrine.
seeking favor from by doing X thing(s)(sacrifice of some sort, leave food/drink as offering, slaughtering other gods followers)
Symbolic allotting of resources to an instinct, nourishing it, and, erm, pathos. Don't do the last one that's mania and gods are perfectly content with you sacrificing some time and mental space, the ritual is for you, not them. In any case if it loses its magic just because you wrap it in a materialist explanation it's not the real deal, yet you can repeat "I'm doing psychology" as mantra as much as you want when connecting up at that level but it's still going to feel religious -- because that's the quality of the qualia you see in that area: Magic happens because you didn't expect things. Otherwise it wouldn't feel that way, it's the sound of your mind getting a good knead-through.