£16m Hindu temple opens in Wembley

[Welsh cake]

Full story:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/10196332.stm

Well it’s taken 14 years to build and has cost around £16million to construct, not bad considering how aesthetically pleasing the architecture is to the eye, we can admire the design, if nothing else.

The message being promoted here by Hindus is of "Vasudev Kutumbakaum", a term used to describe the world as "one big family". A noble cause... but then they go and include a statue inside of Mother Teresa?

DOH

What bothers me is I don't know where this 16 million was amassed from though, as its most likely the taxpayer who has to foot the bill as usual, this brings back memories of when Krishna Avanti primary school opened its doors back in January, only for Hindu school governors to demand more single-faith secondary schools with temples included throughout London and Leicester.


What are your opinions on elaborately designed temples such as these? I've seen some over-the-top Buddhist eastern dragon temples in Thailand before...

[Minimalist]

All religions are equally asinine.

I've seem some fantastic mosques as well as some spectacular cathedrals and none of it disguises the fact that rich priests build monuments to their bullshit to overawe the dolts who "believe."

[bozo]

My opinion is that the severely deluded must like ostentation.
Hope none of them are spending my taxes on the monstrosities!

[Caecilian]

Personally, I like hindu architecture, even though it has a tendency to be over-busy and/or gaudy. The fact that the buildings are religious is neither here nor there for me. I can equally enjoy looking at catholic cathedral, ancient greek temples, and muslim mosques.

Some of my favourite hindu buildings.

The Lakshmi temple near Hassan, Karnataka:



The Brihadeswara in Tanjore, Tamil Nadu:



The rock-cut temples of Ellora, Maharashtra:



None of these has been built recently, of course.

[leo-rcc]

I agree, I like Hindu and Buddhist temples, I can admire the details for ages.

[Paul the Human]

Well, when you have to please over 330,000 deities... you've got to make some pretty fancy temples.

[bozo]

Temples and the like being nice to look at is all well and good, but I still will call them monstrous because of what they are about.
Put another way, if execution and torture were being carried out in them, does that make a difference to their appeal? I think it does. Sort of guilt by association.

[Caecilian]

Temples and the like being nice to look at is all well and good, but I still will call them monstrous because of what they are about.
Put another way, if execution and torture were being carried out in them, does that make a difference to their appeal? I think it does. Sort of guilt by association.

Lets look at it this way. The Kremlin in Moscow is a spectacularly beautiful group of buildings:



But to say that bad things have happened in the Kremlin would be a very big understatement. Mass murder has been plotted within the Kremlin walls repeatedly.

But its still really pretty, at least I think it is. I love Byzantine and old Russian architecture, and old Russian architecture doesn't come any better than this. So I guess I don't buy into guilt by association.

[WingedFoe]

Personally, I don't care what the religious do with their money... it's their money. They can build a solid-gold cathedral for all I care, As long as they don't use my tax money to fund it. I might, however, point out their hypocrisy: teaching their followers to give to the poor while they spend money so frivolously.

[Disinter]

I admire the architecture and precision of this design rather deeply, however this bullshit needs to stop in the name of religion. Then again, I've long since gotten over most of mankind's general stupidity....I'm rather "meh" towards shit like this now....