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\n\u2014 The hole in the ground has been there for a month now, but Caru Das can\u2019t stop admiring it.
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\n\u2014 The hole in the ground has been there for a month now, but Caru Das can\u2019t stop admiring it.
\n<\/p>\n
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) By Lee Bensen Deseret News
\nAug 18, 2016<\/p>\n
Who\u2019d have thought? A Krishna temple in the heart of the Salt Lake Valley?<\/p>\n
Caru (Cha-roo) and his wife, Vai Bhavi, are local leaders of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, started in New York City in 1966 by a devotee of Krishna \u2014 \u201cGod,\u201d in the Hindu vernacular \u2014 named A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. It\u2019s more commonly known as Hare Krishna, a branch of Hinduism.<\/p>\n
An early Hare Krishna enthusiast was George Harrison of The Beatles, whose support helped the new religion gain its popular footing.<\/p>\n
As for Caru, it wasn\u2019t Beatles music that attracted him to the Hare Krishnas, but rather a search for a spiritual foundation that would carry him through this life and the lives to come.<\/p>\n
Born in 1946 in Pennsylvania as Chris Warden, Caru traveled the world in the \u201860s, making his way to the Canary Islands, France, Israel, India and finally Australia, where he ran into Hare Krishna missionaries on George Street in Sydney. He was 24 years old and working construction at the time.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d seen it all: beaches, palm trees, beautiful lands,\u201d Caru says 45 years later. \u201cBut that horizon wasn\u2019t as attractive to me as the inner landscape\u201d those devotees helped him see.<\/p>\n
He went all in, as did his wife, Christine (she\u2019s from England; they met in Australia). In 1970, they were baptized as Krishna devotees and given their new spiritual names \u2014 preparing them both for further enlightenment and, as Caru likes to quip, rid them of the problem of \u201cPeople calling on the phone and asking for \u2018Chris\u2019 and us having to ask, \u2018Which one?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Whatever your mental image of a Krishna consciousness leader, add in humor, friendliness, kindness and charisma and you have Caru Das, a man whose ability to transcend borders, ideologies and religious differences has enabled him, and his religion, to survive and thrive in the middle of Mormondom.<\/p>\n
He and Vai first came to Utah in 1982 to purchase a small AM radio station in Spanish Fork, along with the five acres the station sat on.<\/p>\n
Ten years later, they had expanded to 15 acres and announced plans to build a temple. The ornate structure, believed to be the only legitimate example of Rajasthani architecture in the United States, was designed by Vai, opened in 2001 and has become not only a gathering place for Hare Krishna followers, but also a tourist site that attracts some 50,000 people a year. The annual Color Festival held on the temple grounds has evolved into a Utah County rite of spring, attended by thousands, many of them college students from Utah Valley University or LDS Church-owned Brigham Young University.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe did it the hard way,\u201d says Caru. \u201cWe opened our first temple in a place that\u2019s 90 percent LDS. If we\u2019d done our R&D, that would have never happened.\u201d<\/p>\n
But if converts weren\u2019t exactly beating down their door, the neighbors, Caru adds, nonetheless welcomed them with open arms.<\/p>\n
\u201cGreat neighbors, great friends,\u201d he says. \u201cThe LDS Foundation gave us $20,000 just to get started.\u201d<\/p>\n
The only part that confused the locals, Caru recalls with a grin, was the accessibility of the temple. Mormon temples aren\u2019t open to the general public, while Krishna temples, in addition to being houses of preaching, ritual and worship, are also community centers with places to eat, play music, study, socialize and even stay overnight \u2014 with no restrictions.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople kept asking, \u2018Will the public be invited?\u2019\u201d says Caru. \u201cI was like, \u2018Well, yeah.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Suffice it to say that the success in Spanish Fork paved the way for plans to build a similar, if smaller, temple in Salt Lake County on property the Hare Krishnas own just east of 900 East and south of 3300 South.<\/p>\n
Also designed by Vai, the completed temple \u201cwill be exquisite,\u201d promises her husband.<\/p>\n
Caru envisions the Salt Lake temple as a beacon of spirituality for not only the 100 families active in the faith in the valley, but for others looking for positivity and enlightenment as well.<\/p>\n
\u201cSalt Lake City is a different story than Spanish Fork,\u201d he says. \u201cThere are more here who need ministration. We can make a difference in more lives here.\u201d<\/p>\n
It took three years to get enough funds pledged and secure the proper building permits to get started, but on July 10, after a ceremony apologizing to Krishna for disturbing Mother Earth (but for all good purposes), track hoes moved in and dug the hole Caru has been admiring ever since.<\/p>\n
Soon enough, the foundation will be poured and the temple will take shape. The domes and cones that will grace the exterior, Taj Mahal-style, have already been built and are in storage, awaiting the walls to get framed.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve got the batter and we\u2019ve got the icing,\u201d muses Caru, putting Krishna consciousness on a level all can understand. \u201cNow we\u2019ve just got to bake the cake.\u201d<\/p>\n
Source: http:\/\/goo.gl\/GyGqTG<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Suffice it to say that the success in Spanish Fork paved the way for plans to build a similar, if smaller, temple in Salt Lake County on property the Hare Krishnas own just east of 900 East and south of 3300 South. Also designed by Vai, the completed temple \u201cwill be exquisite,\u201d promises her husband. Caru envisions the Salt Lake temple as a beacon of spirituality for not only the 100 families active in the faith in the valley, but for others looking for positivity and enlightenment as well. \u201cSalt Lake City is a different story than Spanish Fork,\u201d he says. \u201cThere are more here who need ministration. We can make a difference in more lives here.\u201d It took three years to get enough funds pledged and secure the proper building permits to get started, but on July 10, after a ceremony apologizing to Krishna for disturbing Mother Earth (but for all good purposes), track hoes moved in and dug the hole Caru has been admiring ever since. Soon enough, the foundation will be poured and the temple will take shape. The domes and cones that will grace the exterior, Taj Mahal-style, have already been built and are in storage, awaiting the walls to get framed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[90],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30702"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30702\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30704,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30702\/revisions\/30704"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Hare](\"https:\/\/lh3.googleusercontent.com\/-nOwHJ3qzRYM\/V7sv1PdjpsI\/AAAAAAAAeNg\/_5CqyZ0Ma2A\/s0\/2016-08-22_19-01-07.jpg\")
By Lee Bensen<\/strong><\/p>\n