February 1st Update: Ashok shared this post with a number of other people from Temple, and on the Hindu Temple’s Facebook page, and it got a little more attention. I received an email from a Trustee at the Temple, helping to explain a little bit more of our visit. Thanks everyone for the support!
Original Post: This past Saturday Luke and I had the incredible opportunity to visit the Hindu Temple of Rochester. This post is going to be difficult to craft, because there is no way for me to appropriately describe how great our experience was. I have written and re-written every part of it, and I’ve decided there is just no way to describe to you all how cool the folks at the Temple were to us. We were presented with so much information, and met so many people, it was actually a bit overwhelming. I kept thinking, “How am I ever going to be able to tell other people about this?” I also kept reminding myself that this experience was mostly for me, and secondarily for you. So, this is my best attempt at telling you how great it was. I also realize how long this is. I commend–and thank–anyone who reads the entire post.
We were definitely in the right place.
I ask that you keep in mind that this blog is really an account of our experience visiting places and interacting with people. It is by no means intended to be an educational tool about each religion that we encounter. A discussion about and description of each belief system could be a blog entirely on it’s own, and I definitely am not the person to be providing information on the history of religions. We are learning as much as we can about each belief system as we go and visit places, but with a religion like Hinduism, one of the oldest and largest in the world, what I’ve learned in my lifetime has only been a light scratch on the surface.
We had contacted the Temple earlier in the week and asked if it would be appropriate for us to visit. After a few phone calls and tracking down the right people, and explaining the reasons why we were interested in visiting, we were offered a personal tour by the President of the Temple, and the Priest. We were also told that they would be happy to have us, but we had to take off our shoes–it seemed a small price to ask in turn for such a hospitable invitation.
The Temple sits back off of Pinnacle Road in Henrietta. You drive back a quiet, long driveway through a wooded area that opens up in to seven acres where the temple has sat since it was built in 1991. It’s a very unassuming building, but the “Om” stained glass door told us we were in the right place.
