JOINING FORCES

Pennsylvania temple serves growing Hindu community

Associated Press

NEW CUMBERLAND, Pa.

Devotee after devotee padded barefoot up the stairs and across the temple hall.

Most carried foil-covered platters or Tupperware, which they peeled apart to add an offering to the hill of sweets, fruits and other dishes at the foot of the altar.

The worshippers kneeled, pressed their palms together and brought them to the face — a gesture of greeting and respect for the gods in white marble before them.

For Diwali, the biggest festival of the Hindu calendar, the temple priests had dressed the sacred images in dazzling white and gold garments and jeweled crowns — Lord Ram, his bow in hand, his brother, Lakshmana, and wife, Sita.

More than 500 worshippers filled the building for the ritual celebration on a recent Saturday. Many sat cross-legged on the floor, packed knee-to-knee in long rows as they listened to a review of the year’s events at the oldest and largest Hindu temple in Pennsylvania.

Diwali marks the homecoming of Ram after he vanquished a demon king. It symbolizes taking people from darkness to light and the victory of good over evil. Candles glowed among tiers of food, and construction-paper lamps adorned the temple walls, as legend says residents illuminated Ram’s journey with diyas (oil lamps).

The Hindu American Religious Institute has its roots in a Camp Hill basement, where Indian immigrants began gathering for festival celebrations in 1971.

Today, the HARI temple counts 565 member families and is planning a $1 million expansion on its wooded, 7-acre tract off a suburban street in Fairview Township.

The temple draws worshippers from a 50-mile radius, and leaders hope a new multipurpose room, kitchen and additional classrooms will better serve the growing community — estimated at more than 1,200.

“It’s so crowded, as you can see. We’ve had steady, 10 percent annual growth over the last 10 years,” Renu Joshi, a member of the board of trustees, said after the membership meeting.

“New people come all the time. Of the 500 people here tonight, half aren’t even members. They just come to utilize our services.”

HARI serves as a house of worship but also a community center for local Hindus — mostly Indian immigrants and those of Indian descent seeking to sustain their culture and convey it to future generations.

The temple hosts pujas, or rituals of worship, and also offers classes on Indian languages, music, dance and religion during school hours on Sundays, followed by a communal meal prepared by volunteers.

When he was 8, Rajesh Singal moved to Lancaster from India with his parents, who helped found the temple. Now, he relies on the institution to impart to his children what he’s forgotten or never learned.

“I grew up here, so I don’t know the traditions as well as my parents do,” said Singal, 45, a pediatrician from York Township. “Also, it’s a good place to meet people.”

Most Hindus believe in one reality (Brahman) or God who is all- pervasive, but they acknowledge many manifestations of that God. He or she may be worshipped by Hindus in different forms, different ways and by different names.

The HARI founders in central Pennsylvania hailed from the four corners of India and, thus, various Hindu traditions. They deliberately established an independent, non-sectarian temple that would cater to no single denomination but serve a wide range of devotees.

“Here, because you have Hindus of all traditions, if they each tried to have their own facility, there wouldn’t be enough people to sustain it. But if they join forces, they have better success,” said Jeffrey D. Long, a Hindu who directs the religious and Asian studies departments at Elizabethtown College.

However, the community has grown to a degree that three years ago a second mandir, or Hindu temple, opened in Lower Paxton Township, Dauphin County, for followers of the Swaminarayan sect popular in far western India.

HARI chose as its central deity Ram, the seventh incarnation of Lord Krishna, because of the avatar’s wide appeal in both the north and south of India. The temple also employs two full-time priests — one each from the north and south, which celebrate weddings and other rites differently.

HARI celebrates the festivals sacred to many of the Hindu subgroups within the congregation and even those of a small Jain community.

Jains are not Hindu, but the 20 or so families in the region have been welcomed at the temple, where they gather for monthly functions and yearly celebration of the birth of their god, Mahavir Bhagvan, said Dhimant H. Desai, a pharmacology professor at the Penn State Cancer Institute in Hershey and practicing Jain.