My father was a Russian Orthodox (Christian/Catholic) priest. My mother's family helped found a church when they came to the United States. My home is half-church.
My parents were super-active in the church and were that way all their lives. They didn't live by the more distorted Pauline doctrines that have taken root in American evangelical Christianity, but followed the teachings and examples of Christ himself. Mum loved the counterculture movement of the 1960s even though she was past her 40s at the time it was happening, and Father let his hair grow long and allowed a rock band to use the church hall to practice.
That philosophy didn't make them particularly popular even in their own church -- the Orthodox faith has really taken a strong turn toward conservatism in the last couple of decades and some of its teachings never were that progressive to begin with. There are plenty of church members that use scripture without context to excuse showing hatred to their fellow children of God and others that are more Pharisitical in their lifestyles. I just got confronted in church in the open last Sunday during the most important part of the service by a fellow parishioner who didn't agree with how I recite our pre-communion prayer ... and, yes, we just speak it aloud, we don't sing it or anything where there's much room for deviation.
I've seen plenty of evangelical Christians here that are just a couple of steps shy of being complete parallels to Islamists, who pervert the teachings ... and, more importantly, the spirits ... of their faiths. There are a lot of others that think that just walking over that threshold into a worship place absolves them of hateful actions outside the church. And it applies to the more traditional Christian sects, too. But, there are a number of us that still try to recognize the lives we are truly meant to live if we truly believe, and, honestly, it's not very different than just following what I think is the natural feeling in anyone's heart to be a good person.
Christianity, though, is a really easy faith to follow. "Love God with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself." It's funny, but, if you actually speak that before any test of conscience you face, it manifests itself naturally and it's easy to know the proper course. Having the strength to always follow it is what too many of our faith lack. And, again, that goes for people in general.