Marc Goudeau

I arrived at the front door of the Hindu Temple Society of Greater New Orleans to meet priest Dr. Bharat Joshi. At the door, I was asked to remove my shoes, where I was  greeted by the priest who asked me to have a seat in a room adjacent to the impressive altar, which lines the entire back wall of the temple with various deities.

I quickly realized that being accepted into this temple is not a question, but a given, and that the aim of the Hindu Temple is not to convert members but to include them.

“The question should not arise whether I am Hindu, you are Christian, anyone is from Islam,” Joshi said. “We Hindu, we’ve never believed in converting anyone. In whichever community we are born, we should follow the rules and regulations and we must have faith in our own god, our own prophet, whoever.”

This belief struck me as both profoundly obvious and unique.

Joshi offered a metaphor to illustrate why the individual gods worshipped in all of the different religions are compatible with one another.

“You know that each and every river, no matter from where it starts, at last will end or it will meet the ocean, anywhere,” Joshi said. “This is the universal rule. In the same way, whichever religion you are believing — whichever god or prophet or whoever you are worshipping — we Hindu believe that the Almighty God in the form of all these different gods and prophets. After all, they are coming from the only single and common power, which you may call a White Light, or Supernatural Power.”

He said he believes that all prayers, like a river, flow into the ocean that is the true God, or Brahma, a belief that seemingly renders which god you worship unimportant, as long as you have genuine faith in the one you that you do.

This open and all-inclusive view may offend followers of Christianity, Islam and Judaism, as it seems to undermine an individual God, Allah or Yahweh. However, the idea is that they are all a part of and feed into the same higher power, so there is no conflict between them and the three main Hindu deities.

Anyone who is interested in Hinduism should attend a service or simply converse with Dr. Joshi. As Joshi said, “The main principle for each and every human being must be that you leave and come quietly and happily, with health, wealth and peace, and live in a way that allows the same for others.”