Over the summer I sat next to a nice Indian woman at work. She was a faithful and practicing Hindu. I have not had much opportunity in my life to speak with people born into Hinduism; most of my contact has been with disaffected suburban American young people who have embraced Hinduism or the Hare Krishna sect as a part of their rebellion against their parents. But my co-worker was not like that. She was a Hindu from birth, from India and with Indian Hindu parents and had just recently come to America.

One day, when we were speaking of religion in India she told me, “You know Ben, not to be offensive or anything and you don’t seem like this, but in India, only the poor are Christians; all the Christians are poor—they are the people who have nothing.”

I thought to myself that sounded about right.

I wish I was more like that.