Nope, it is not that strong. Silver grants 2 culture per tile with monopoly. A monument with Tradition grants more than Silver.
2 per tile is sizeable. In an expansion city, a monument is 4 culture and an amphi is 2. A single silver tile gives 1/3 of that. The high culture in a Tradition capital makes the proportional gain from silver smaller on a national level, but for the expansions I feel that it matters a lot.
I don't think so. If I had slightly lower culture I would have actually gotten more faith because my borders reached their expansion limit so quickly. My capital ran out of tiles to grow to in Renaissance.
Front-loaded faith is naturally worth more, be it for spreading or just reinvesting into holy sites. Is the scaling so significant that it matters more than this?