Michigan Temple
Forty years ago only few Hindu families settled in the Grand Rapids area and today there are several hundreds and still counting. For many years Hindu Devotees of Grand Rapids had Pujas and Satsang (religious gatherings) in various homes, Banquet Halls, and Schools. It was a long felt desire of the community to have a Temple in Grand Rapids. West Michigan Hindu temple was formed by a group of volunteers who took it upon themselves to build a temple in the community they lived. With the support and commitment of many long term residents of Grand Rapids, an organization quickly came into prominence to spearhead the cause for building the temple that you are seeing today. The Mission of the temple is to promote the values of peace, harmony and human values of truth, tolerance, forgiveness, respect for one another and sharing through the means of prayer, bhajans, and community spirit. The vision of the Temple is to create a centre for prayer and Hindu culture that serves the region of West Michigan. The center will promote Hinduism as a way of life through bhajans, Satsangh, prayers, community programs and cultural events.
The path to the present temple began in 2001. A few dedicated volunteers of the community got together and built a small Pole barn structure in Greenville for worship. The response of the community was overwhelming and people from Big Rapids, Holland, Muskegon and Grand Rapids started to come and pray at this Prayer Hall. Unfortunately, the prayer hall was not suitable for the harsh winters of the Midwest. Not to lose the momentum that was generated, the community wanted to continue the prayers and involvement of the children in Bal Vihar. The immediate goal was to find a place to continue our weekly prayers but with a clear vision and mission of building a permanent temple for the West Michigan Hindu community. Our short term needs were met by the availability of the Banquet Hall of GrandMark Lodge in Grandville for the biweekly prayers. But, to attain our long-term goal of building a temple we formed a non-profit organization.
On June 1st 2002 the name West Michigan Hindu Temple was incorporated (the State of Michigan Incorporation No 774-697).
It was during this time Srini Iyer took the lead and formed a committee. The committee’s main mission was to make the temple a reality for the West Michigan community. The first committee met and the following group of people were identified Renu Malhotra, V.J.Desai, Madhuri Acharya, Jiten Shah, Sridhar Sundaram, Ram Ramakrishnan, Sree Menon, Rashmi and Girish Juneja, Pravin and Taru Patel, JP and VP Vadivelu, Prasad Reddy, Rajinder Gautam, Sudhir and Naina Bora, Simha Magal, Arun Dalmia, Suresh Bhargava, Chunnilal and Narbada Raniga, Mahi Mahesh, Suresh and Sarla Puri, Jai Kishen, Bhaskar Gunda, Chandra Dommeti, Srinivas Voruganti, Satish Damodaran, Mahindran Balakrishnan, Vamsidhar Ravi, Renuka Gopinath and Ashok Premchandran. However some of the members left the town for better future and we were left with a core group of people who met regularly. The major task of this group was to raise money, buy the land and build the temple.