For the first time since the Colorado Senate first convened in 1861, legislators began their day with heads bowed for prayer in Sanskrit. It began with "OM," the mystical syllable containing the universe, according to Hindu belief. Hindu chaplain Rajan Zed, in a loose peach tunic and saffron shawl, softly recited the Gayatri Mantra from Rig-Veda, a 500-year-old prayer
from the world's oldest religion that asks: "Lead me from the unreal to the Real." The Hindu prayer in the Colorado legislature is one of a long string of "firsts" for Zed.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., invited Zed, who lives in Reno, to offer the first Hindu prayer in the Senate in July. Since then, Zed has initiated Hindu prayers in the California and New Mexico senates, and he is slated to say prayers for lawmakers in Utah, Washington and Arizona. "I feel very humble. My community feels very proud," Zed said.

Zed is a guest of families in Denver's Hindu community, estimated at 10,000 people by Ved P. Nanda, a vice provost at the University of Denver's Sturm College of Law. "We talk about pluralism in this country and tolerating differences," Nanda said. "Hindus don't 'tolerate' differences, we celebrate them."