Sutra, Tantra and Ati

Why is it that (nearly always), religious orientation is framed in terms of belief and/or faith? After all, if someone says they are religious, surely they must have something going on inside them that's different from someone who says they are not religious. That is, religion should be connected to experience and not belief or faith. If this is carefully done, then I could say, "I'm not religious because I've never had a religious experience, or more generally, I've never had a transcendental experience which I would call religious." Or, I could say, "I'm religious because I have this experience of God talking to me and I don't think I'm a schizophrenic." (That last part sounds snide but is not meant to be.) And I think that using the term spirituality instead of religion doesn't work anymore. The term spirituality has started to sound very vague and merely philosophical. Also, if we start having conversations about experience rather than belief or faith, then the ex-new agers, spiritually inclined folks and Christian fundamentalists can actually have a conversation. At present, there is no conversation between these disparate folks.