BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir TorontoBAPS ਸ੍ਰੀ ਸੁਆਮੀਨਾਰਾਇਣ ਮੰਦਰ, ਟੋਰਾਂਟੋ

In Etobicoke, in the northwest of Toronto, a white stone temple rises over Claireville Drive as if it had been lifted whole from India. The BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir, opened on 22 July 2007, is a traditional shikharbaddha mandir, a pinnacled temple built to the rules of the ancient Shilpa Shastras, and it is described as the largest traditional Hindu temple of its kind in Canada. Its 24,000 pieces of hand carved Italian Carrara marble, Turkish limestone and Indian pink stone were carved in India, shipped across the world, numbered and assembled in Toronto in only 18 months. Around the mandir stand a carved wooden haveli and a Heritage Museum, together forming the best known Hindu temple complex in the country.

What is the BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir in Toronto?

The BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir is a Hindu temple at 61 Claireville Drive, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, built by the BAPS Swaminarayan Sanstha, a global spiritual organisation within the Swaminarayan branch of Hinduism. The grounds cover about 18 acres, or 7.3 hectares. In the central shrine, Swaminarayan is worshipped with Gunatitanand Swami as Akshar Purushottam Maharaj, and further shrines hold Radha and Krishna, Sita and Rama, Shiva and Parvati, Vishnu and Lakshmi, Ganesha and Hanuman, together with the lineage of BAPS gurus. The mandir is open daily for worship and to visitors of every background, and it belongs to the same BAPS family of stone temples as Jugti's entries on Robbinsville in New Jersey and Chino Hills in California.

How was a carved stone temple built in Canada in 18 months?

The project began on 23 July 2000, when devotees performed the shilanyas, the first stone laying ceremony, on the future site in the presence of Pramukh Swami Maharaj, the BAPS leader who inspired the temple. Work proceeded in phases: the haveli, the cultural centre, was opened first, on 18 July 2004, with a Vishvashanti Mahayagna, a prayer ceremony for world peace and family unity, attended by community leaders and representatives of other faiths. The stone mandir followed. Its parts were first sent to India, where skilled craftsmen carved and polished them; every piece was then numbered and shipped to Toronto, where more than 400 volunteers helped assemble the building. The whole temple was completed in 18 months of construction and at an estimated cost of 40 million dollars, funded entirely by donations, with much of the labour given as seva, selfless service offered as devotion. There is no steel skeleton inside: following Vedic building practice, the walls themselves are load bearing, and 434 pieces make up the ceiling of the front entrance alone.

Who opened the Toronto mandir in 2007?

The official opening took place on 22 July 2007 in the presence of Pramukh Swami Maharaj. Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty and Toronto Mayor David Miller attended the opening, a sign of how closely the new temple was already woven into public life in Canada. The opening crowned a three day festival that included a nagar yatra, a parade of the deities through Toronto with traditional Indian folk dance and music, and prayers for world peace. Ten years later, in July 2017, the mandir marked its tenth anniversary in the presence of Mahant Swami Maharaj, Pramukh Swami Maharaj's successor, with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Toronto Mayor John Tory taking part. The temple had earlier joined Doors Open Toronto from 2005 to 2009, when volunteers gave guided tours of the complex to the wider public.

Inside the mandir: worship through the day

A BAPS mandir day is ordered around the murtis, the sacred images in which, devotees believe, the divine is present once invoked. Swamis wake the deities before dawn with morning hymns, bathe them and offer food and garments suited to the hour and the season; food offered to the deities is then shared with devotees as prasadam. Aarti, the ceremony in which a lighted wick is circled before the murtis while devotees sing, is performed five times a day: Mangala, Shangar, Rajabhoga, Sandhya and Shayana Aarti. The mandir's own site lists the campus as open from 9 in the morning to 7 in the evening, with darshan in the morning and again in the afternoon and evening, closing briefly around the thal food offering rituals. Beside worship, BAPS Charities runs health fairs, walkathons and community programmes from the site; in April 2021 the temple hosted a COVID-19 vaccination clinic with the William Osler Health System and Toronto Public Health.

The haveli and the Heritage Museum

Visitors usually enter through the haveli, the cultural centre whose intricately carved wooden facade announces the complex before the white stone appears. Inside, a courtyard is ringed by teak and rosewood columns carved with motifs from mythology, the sun and moon, peacocks and elephants. The haveli holds the assembly hall for weekly congregations, classrooms for youth cultural, religious and educational activities, from music lessons and scripture classes to career seminars, a full size gymnasium, a shop selling vegetarian snacks, and living quarters for the swamis who serve the mandir. Within the complex, the Heritage Museum houses the Understanding Hindu Dharma Exhibition, which introduces the key ideas of Hinduism and the story of Hinduism today, and celebrates the part Indo-Canadians have played in art, architecture, science, education, culture and public life in Canada. Read with the Nagara temple architecture explainer, the mandir's own stone pinnacles show the north Indian temple form the haveli's timber carving echoes in wood.

Visiting the BAPS Mandir in Toronto

The mandir stands at 61 Claireville Drive, Toronto, Ontario M9W 5Z7, near Highway 427 and Finch Avenue in Etobicoke, and is reached most easily by car, with local buses stopping on Claireville Drive. Entry is free and the temple is open daily; the official site lists campus hours of 9:00 AM to 7:00 PM, with darshan breaks around the thal rituals, so a mid morning or late afternoon visit catches the shrines open. As at other BAPS temples, visitors remove footwear inside, dress modestly with shoulders and knees covered, and keep photography to the outside of the buildings so worship is not disturbed. Allow time for the museum and the haveli as well as the mandir itself. Travellers following Canada's Hindu temples can continue to Brampton's Hindu Sabha Mandir, a very different, community built temple a short drive west.