i think the religious content of my upbringing was instrumental in teaching me early on that "it's important to think of others, accept them unless they hurt you, and help them when you're in a privileged position", which is contrary to my original disposition. my upbringing was "catholic", but figures such as saint francis of assisi and saint john bosco were much more prominent influences in practice than jesus himself, let alone anything from the old testament (which to me was never any different from greek or egyptian mythology, and nobody expected or demanded me to believe that it was. old testament = hebrew mythology)
as i grew up though, religion ceased to serve any purpose. it started to feel only pointless and frustrating, and as soon as i questioned it, it was clear that it was, so i dropped it. my father asked me "why won't you go to church anymore?", i said "why would i?", and that was it. he didn't have anything else to say, and neither did i
for a while there was a vacuum where the belief in god used to be, and it made me feel very alone. then i read some material about zen and tao. nowadays, as far as spirituality goes, i'm content with that, and i'm not looking for anything else. it's basically "the religion of irreligion". it's a matter of achieving practice through perspective rather than the other way around, which suits me perfectly