India, Jan. 12 -- Priya (name changed) has been coming to our seminary campus every Christmas for over twenty-four years. She is a practising Hindu-open, thoughtful, unafraid to ask sharp questions about what Christians believe and how we celebrate. About the priesthood, about the meaning of celibacy.

This last point has always fascinated her. "It is not usual in our tradition that someone at a young age like you sacrifice their entire lives for God," she told me once. Her wonder was genuine. She understood sannyasa-renunciation-but to see young men embrace it so completely, to devote themselves wholly to prayer and service, struck her as both strange and compelling.

This curiosity is unremarkable here at Seminary Hills. Our Christmas c...