What Drew You To Your Faith?

[Marzipan]

Is there a particular aspect of your faith or denomination that made you really feel like it was the right choice for you? Although I am no longer a religious Jew, I like the fact that my religion doesn't believe that it is the right religion for everyone. I like the laid back feeling of that. What about the rest of you?

[Lori]

I was raised Catholic so I wasn't really drawn to Christianity so much as born into it. But I would say I was drawn back to it because, once I was able to get through all of the cultural and political and social baggage around it, I do think it is an intellectually and ethically viable religion that God uses to reach people, including me.

I was drawn to the Episcopal Church for a few reasons. I like the ritual of the services. Being raised Catholic, it's very familiar to me. Anytime I've been to less formal services (in terms of liturgical structure), I've felt like something was missing. (That's not to say there's anything wrong with more informal worship, but for me it doesn't work as well.) I like knowing that on any Sunday morning people around the world are hearing the same readings and praying the same prayers and thinking about the same texts. I also was drawn to the church because of it's theological diversity, and it's relative political progressivism. I think it does a nice job of blending respect for tradition with the need to respond to what God is revealing to us today, and that's very important to me. I like that a wide variety of interpretations of things and stances on issues are allowed and welcomed, and that I never feel like I need to keep my mouth shut if I don't believe the "right" thing.

[AdinaVerbena]

My father is a pastor, so I wasn't originally drawn to my church so much as just made to go. While I came to my faith at an early age, it wasn't really until I was in late high school that I knew that the particular form of Christianity I practiced (Reformed...I'm an Orthodox Presbyterian by denomination) was the one I believed to be right for me. I know that some people think that Reformed theology seems very bleak and rigid, but I think of it as freeing and hopeful, if for no other reason than the doctrine of grace. My favorite verse from my favorite hymn says, "O to grace how great a debtor daily I’m constrained to be; let that grace now, like a fetter, bind my wand’ring heart to thee. Prone to wander—Lord, I feel it—prone to leave the God I love: here’s my heart, O take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above." That is me. I flounder and fail and sometimes turn my back on my God, but by his grace, I'm drawn back to him and strengthened in my resolve to serve him better.

[Kristen]

Are you OPC, Adina? I'm PCA, so not far off from that.

Nak, so I'll answer fully later.

[gr8mommy]

I came to the Episcopal Church for many of the reasons Lori outlined. I like that I'm encouraged to question, to think, to go outside the box and find my own relationship with God and Christ.

[AdinaVerbena]

Are you OPC, Adina? I'm PCA, so not far off from that.


We attended a PCA in Florida and might here as well, since we haven't had a chance to check out more than one church since we got here (the kids started getting chickenpox a few days after we visited that church and are only now no longer contagious).

[Shana]

My father is a pastor, so I wasn't originally drawn to my church so much as just made to go. Same here! Nice to meet a fellow PK on this board.... Christi is one too :D

Ummm yeah... so I had to go, and at the age of 13 made the decision to accept Christ into my life, and yes, it actually did take 13 years of living as a pastor's kid to come to the conclusion that Christianity and Jesus were for me :)

What drew me.... hard to say. Probably the #1 factor was the consistent, daily example shown to me by my dad. If one ever needed an example of the love of Christ in action... it would be him :)