Princy Sethi is an associate with the Ahluwalia Law Offices, a three-lawyer, general practice firm in north Dallas. She's also Hindu.

For Sethi, these two elements of her life are not only inextricably linked but she says the teachings of her religion require that she strive to be the best lawyer she can be.

"In Hinduism, there is karma and dharma. Dharma is duty; Karma is the fruits of your labor," she says. And she explains that by fulfilling her dharma to be a lawyer who can "be fair, be good and do the right thing," good karma will come to her. That, she believes, means being rewarded "not only in this lifetime but in the next lifetime."

Sethi's spirituality is welcome at her firm, because it's also important to the firm's name partner, Pallavia Ahluwalia, a practicing Sikh.

"My religion does shape me," Ahluwalia says, "and so it has to shape my practice." For being a good Sikh, she explains, requires followers not to study the religion's teachings in isolation but rather to observe its beliefs "in whatever you are doing while you are leading your life."

Last December, she says a man came to the office who wanted to hire the firm to file for divorce. When she started talking to him about it, however, she says she noticed that his eyes would fill with tears each time he mentioned his wife's name.

"I said, 'Do you think you still love your wife?' and he started crying and said that he did,' " she recalls. Instead of immediately taking his case, she says she suggested that he go home and spend some time working on his marriage. She told him to call her back if he decided he still wanted to file papers, and she'd be happy to help him then. She added that she recently did hear back from him, "only to update that things are OK with them."

That advice may not have been the best decision businesswise, but Ahluwalia says that "doing good without expecting much in return" is a tenet of her religion.

"Of course, we are practicing law and giving legal advice, and this needs money coming in, but at some level the spirituality that comes from religion has you step out of the business situation to determine, 'Is this best for the client?' "

Ahluwalia and Sethi are two of many lawyers who integrate elements of religiosity into their daily practice of law.

Indeed, religion and law can be complementary, says professor Ellen Pryor of Southern Methodist University's Dedman School of Law. "Faith is a spiritual journey, and law is a journey," says Pryor, who in 2002 created the class "Faith, Morality and the Practice of Law." "You just have to be able to put them together."

And therein lies the challenge. Lawyers who integrate their belief system into their legal life say it's the most fulfilling way to practice. But they all agree it isn't easy.

"People want a magic wand, like once you realize you're a Christian and you decide to serve Christ, everything's different. But there is no magic wand -- you can't just say, 'I am doing all of this, because God's calling me' -- it's not that simple," Pryor says.

Fort Worth, Texas, litigator Thomas S. Brandon Jr. agrees. "It's not easy, because there are all kinds of pressures on you to do what everybody else does, but you have this internal compass guiding you to want to do the right thing, and sometimes that can be a disadvantage, especially in litigation."

Brandon has been examining and questioning issues of his Christianity and the practice of law since he made a commitment to God as a young lawyer in the early 1970s.

"For me it was a switch from, 'I want to be making lots and lots of money,' to 'I want to serve God,' and I think about that every day," he says.

He also participated in organized discussions of Christianity and law, through his membership in the Virginia-based Christian Legal Society. For more than 20 years he has attended the CLS regional conference in Salado, Texas, where he joins like-minded lawyers in asking tough questions of their faith and exploring seemingly bottomless issues, such as how to practice in a Christian manner yet provide zealous representation, he says.

One ever-controversial issue among Christians is the meaning of 1 Corinthians 6, he says, which discourages Christians from suing each other in secular court. Some Christian lawyers interpret this scripture literally, but Brandon says he believes that litigation is sometimes necessary, especially in situations such as insurance, in which suits often are prerequisites to companies paying claims.

Nevertheless, he says he tries to offer out-of-court alternatives to clients wherever possible and appropriate.

"A lot of times potential clients will come to my office and say, 'I've been told I need to file this lawsuit,' and I say, 'No, you need to go to this person -- go and see if you can resolve this, and here's what you can say,' " Brandon explains. "I've counseled many people who have ended up resolving a dispute they would otherwise pay thousands of dollars to resolve."

In some cases, he says, he has even suggested an additional avenue for resolution: forgiveness.

Despite his faith-based approach to practice, Brandon says he feels his beliefs are personal, and he doesn't cite Scripture or even discuss his religious beliefs with clients unless they specifically ask him. In fact, he speculates that there are "many clients who probably don't know I am a Christian."

SHARING THE WORD

Houston lawyer Alan F. Levin's clients know he's Jewish, however, because he tells them.

Levin believes in bringing religion -- his religion and other religions -- into the discussion at his mediations as a way to create an atmosphere of spirituality.

A "message from the Lord," he says, helps parties "come together in harmony and respect -- they may never see each other again, and they certainly won't do business together -- but for one day they can work together and find a conclusion."

Levin doesn't focus his practice on Judaism or on other religions, nor does he cater to any particular subgroup of potential clients other than those who need disputes resolved.

But if, through interacting with parties he discovers they are "people of religion," he says he can use that point as a dispute resolution tool, developing it as a point of commonality, and, from there, suggesting to the parties that they might have other areas of common ground.

Dallas lawyer John McShane takes it one step further: He'll actually pray with a client. He describes these prayers as "very general and simple."

Although he's a Christian, he says he words his prayers in a way that they're appropriate to any client who subscribes to "a belief in a higher power" regardless of their specific denomination.

"It's very comforting to the client and to me to do that. It is a very special human moment, a moment where we share our humanity and our dependence on God," he says. "I've had people come back and say that it was a special moment for them, an unforgettable moment."

But McShane is quick to point out that he never prays to win. Instead, he asks that "the outcome be in the best interests of all concerned" and that "we simply be at our highest and best as we go through the process." This message, he says, "gives a sense of acceptance and peace regardless of the outcome."

As important as religion is to his practice, Levin acknowledges that the secular nature of his business requires walking a fine line. "Introducing a shroud of spirituality is very, very helpful, but on the other hand, I try not to take it too far. I am not a rabbi, and they are not parishioners."

McShane agrees. He doesn't automatically assume every client is open to prayer. Rather, "that requires some discernment, because it would certainly be uncomfortable and off-putting to do that with the wrong client."

It's important to proceed cautiously, he advises. "Do not do it until you are absolutely certain that it's appropriate for this client under these circumstances."

To make that call, McShane says he starts by listening to his clients. "Generally, I deal with people who are experiencing a great deal of stress and crisis -- professional license discipline cases, divorce, criminal charges -- and in seeing how my clients are responding to the crisis and seeing the support that they gather around them, it's pretty easy to tell," he says. "If one client tells me that members of their church are supporting and praying for them, I know that would be a client I would be comfortable praying with. If the client tells me that his buddies at the sports bar are giving him 'atta boys,' that doesn't tell me they're open to it yet."

Not only is it not appropriate with all clients, it's also not appropriate in all situations, he says. "In situations where it is appropriate, it's most likely to occur before a significant event in a case, before a trial or a deposition or mediation -- some time when the stakes are high and there's a lot on the line."

Spirituality can also help a lawyer personally, says former Corpus Christi, Texas, trial lawyer William J. Chriss, executive director of the Texas Center for Legal Ethics and Professionalism in Austin. Chriss also holds a master's degree in applied orthodox Christian theology from St. John of Damascus Institute of Theology at the University of Balamand in Lebanon.

In his experience, he says, lawyers who are "well-rounded spiritually" and who are "connected to a power more important than themselves" can find it easier to avoid substance abuse and depression, both of which can lead lawyers to commit ethical violations they would not otherwise commit, Chriss says.

He also knows faith can play a major role in recovery from depression and addiction. "Recovering alcoholics and drug abusers will tell you, one of the important tenets of AA or any other recovery organization is that you put yourself in the hands of a higher power," he says.

INNER CONFLICT

In teaching her course on faith and law, Pryor says she found her students hungry to discuss how faith and law intersected in the real world.

"Everyone has an internal moral scaffolding that's their own that they've built up by the time they get to law school. For many of them [in the class], that was faith-based. Now they were going to leave law school and go into practice, [and] they had concerns about how that scaffolding was going to hold up. 'How can I be a good person and a good lawyer?'"

One of the important lessons of the course, says Pryor, was that practicing law in a faithful way wasn't always going to involve issues that were clearly right or wrong; rather it was more nuanced. "The devil is in the details, and those details can be hard at times," she says.

She didn't teach this lesson directly. She says she allowed students to hear it from those who know best: lawyers in the community who incorporated religiosity into their profession. These lawyers came to the class to lead discussions on their real-life experiences.

One such lecturer, a Jewish criminal-defense lawyer in Dallas, believed it was his responsibility to stand between an accused person and the state. "His belief was so powerful that it resonated with his belief and with his moral core," she says.

Yet the lawyer disclosed to the class that he'd had to make decisions in his practice -- specifically, in one case where the law prevented him from disclosing a certain piece of evidence -- that were not entirely consistent with his faith.

Through this anecdote and others shared by guest lecturers, Pryor says her students learned a helpful way to integrate faith, morality and law. "You line up who you are -- your skill set -- and that has nothing to do with morality and religion, and once you're clear on that, you ask, 'What is my life narrative about the work I do and why it matters, given my faith and my moral perspective?'"

With this approach, she says, "it's easier to deal with the details. It makes it [difficult decisions] easier to take. You have an idea why it connects, and the details fall away." Otherwise, she adds, "the work is just too hard."

Syeeda Amin recently made a difficult decision in her career that involved her identity as an observant Muslim: She reduced her full-time schedule to a part-time one.

"Among observant people, family is huge, religious activities are huge," says Amin, a labor and employment associate with Littler Mendelson in Dallas. "I don't have kids, but my lifestyle is such that I have a lot of personal commitments and family commitments. I need to make time for my husband and for activities with the mosque. I needed balance."

Now, Amin works four days a week and is available as needed on Fridays. This allows her to better focus on Friday services (Friday is the Islamic holy day) and her involvement with her mosque in Frisco, Texas, including two-hour Qur'an classes on Saturdays and teaching Sunday school.

Working 70-hour weeks, she says, was making it difficult to properly prepare for the classes she taught and for the class she took, which involved the study of the original Arabic text of the Qur'an. Plus, she found she missed out on much of the fellowship, an important part of her connection to her Muslim community. "I wanted to do a good job at work, but I also wanted to enjoy these activities," she says.

Like Sethi's Hindu belief in karma and dharma, Amin says Islam has a concept of treating one's job as a calling.

"There is a sense that, whatever you are, you have to do it well, you have to do that [job] well to please God," she says. "You must bring 'ihsan' to everything you do. It's, literally, an awareness that God is watching, but not like Big Brother. It's more that God is present, so in everything you do, you want to be honest and true and genuine, and everything short of your best would not please God."

In a pure context, she says, ihsan applies to prayers and family life, "but among American Muslims, there is a sense that it should extend to everything you do."

She says she thought long and hard on how to reconcile the demands of her faith and her profession. She also prayed. "I prayed a lot, I asked God, 'Please help me find a situation where I won't have to choose.'"

When she approached her supervisors at Littler with a request to reduce her hours, "they didn't bat an eye," she says. "They [the firm] really made it work for me."

For Dallas managing partner Scott McDonald, it didn't matter whether Amin's issues stemmed from family or religion or other personal commitments.

"They were important to her, and so we wanted to work with her on it," he says. "It was simply a matter of looking at it and saying, 'What do you need?' and, 'Can we accommodate that?' [and] once we talked about it, there was no reason why we couldn't at least try, and it has worked out fine."

While Amin admits that her balancing act isn't always perfect, she says she's happy.

"When religion is the filter through which you live your life, you have to examine every opportunity that's presented to you. If you get offered a promotion and more money, that's great, but you have to have the constant dialogue with yourself about your faith," she says. "It's something I work on all the time, and I think I am blessed."

Former Texas Lawyer senior reporter Mark Donald contributed to this article.