BUENA PARK, CALIFORNIA, October 15, 2008: A new $20 million Jain temple opened last weekend, following 11 days of dancing, worship and theater topped off by a parade and a traditional ceremony to install sacred marble statues, representing people who attained enlightenment.
Together with its attached cultural center, classrooms and a planned 10,000-tome library, the complex replaces a much smaller temple and will be the largest Jain spiritual centre outside India. The soaring marble-and-limestone facade, with its domed roof and gleaming, coffee-colored pillars, takes up almost an entire block in this working-class city. “You don’t see temples this size very often, even in India,” said Dilip V. Shah, president of Federation of Jain Associations in North America.