I generally don't do polls, but I couldn't resist this one because the topic fascinates me endlessly.
I was born, baptized, raised, and confirmed Lutheran (the old LCA, now the ELCA). No fire and brimstone in my upbringing. The congregation was mainly young families; the pastor's son was my age and president of my class in high school. Much "practical Christianity," with common Lutheran emphases on justification by faith and the sacredness of all vocations. I was interested in the ministry as a possible occupation--until I served a term on church council while I was in college.
I have never had any kind of "conversion experience." Faith and belief have just always been a part of the structure of my life. One of the most important lessons I ever learned came not in church but from one of my religion professors in college. It was a definition of "faith" not as a belief system but as a living one's life trusting in God. (I took a lot of religion and philosophy electives--interesting subject matter, interesting readings, and no term papers. ...)
As a young adult I did the typical falling away from regular worship. In addition, I had moved to a city that is not strongly Lutheran, and I was loyal to denomination of my upbringing. In the mid 1990s I began to feel a personal need to return to formal worship in my life. A friend invited me to our neighborhood Episcopal parish. I found the liturgy itself and the style of worship not too different from what I had grown up with, so I continued attending. In 1998 I was received into membership--for the very practical reason that I was supporting the parish financially but until I became a member, I couldn't vote for the vestry (the church leadership).
The parish has been a good spiritual home for me. I'm comfortable with the form and style of worship, and the parish has a large gay presence from the leadership levels down, yet it doesn't exist to be a "gay church." So it's a place where I can be who I am at worship without my sexual orientation being an "issue." (I'm speaking about my parish level here, not the larger issues in the Episcopal Church.) Another reason I'm comfortable is Anglicanism's historic acceptance of a wide variety of private personal beliefs. My own personal belief system is almost certainly not orthodox in a Nicene Creed kind of way, but the practice of an historic, mainline Protestant denomination "works" for me because it's how I was raised and part of who I am.
The funny thing is, formal requirements for congregational membership--keeping your name "on the books"--are so minimal these days, that I technically still a member of my home Lutheran church as well. Plus the ELCA and the ECUSA are in full communion with each other, anyway.
Very early on in my
Brokeback experience, I noticed something I found very interesting. Despite the tragedy of the film, I would leave the theater with the same peaceful, spiritually uplifted feeling I have when I leave church after receiving Holy Communion.
Lynne--if you read this--I think the Quakers were granted and give the rest of us a valuable insight in the concept of the Inner Light.