![\"\"](\"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Eternal-gandhi-museum.jpg\")
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mahatma Gandhi Library and Unity of Houston along with Arya Samaj Greater Houston, Jung Center\u2019s Mind Body Spirit Institute, The Ismaili Jamatkhana and Center, Baha\u2019I Faith of Houston, Interfaith Ministries for Greater Houston and many other organizations commemorated Mahatma Gandhi\u2019s 70th death anniversary at Unity of Houston on Saturday, February 2, 2019 from 3 PM to 5 PM at Unity of Houston located at 2929 Unity Drive, Houston, TX 77056.
\n\u201cA good heart is the best religion.\u201d
\nThis teaching of Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama would have been endorsed by Mahatma Gandhi as well, said Dr. Alejandro Chaoul of the Jung Center\u2019s Mind Body Spirit Institute in Houston.<\/p>\n
Dr. Chaoul was the keynote speaker at Shraddanjali, a memorial tribute to Mahatma Gandhi on the occasion of the 70th death anniversary of the Apostle of Peace. Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated on January 30, 1948.<\/p>\n
Mahatma Gandhi Library, Unity of Houston, Arya Samaj Greater Houston, Interfaith Ministries for Greater Houston, the Ismaili Jamatkhana Center, Mind Body Spirit Institute, Bahai\u2019s of Houston and other organizations joined the service and paid tribute to Mahatma Gandhi on Saturday, February 2 at the Main Sanctuary of Unity of Houston.<\/p>\n
Dr. Chaoul had an avid interest in interfaith and visited the land of Gandhi, a symbol of inner and outer peace in 1989. Gandhi symbolized world peace, he said. After visiting the Gandhi Memorial in New Delhi and traveling in northern India, Dr. Chaoul happened to be in the presence of the Dalai Lama when he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. His encounter with the spiritual leader rendered him literally speechless.<\/p>\n
\u201cI met someone who touched my heart. I was crying\u201d, Dr. Chaoul recalled and reminisced on the words of the Dalai Lama, \u201cA good heart is the best religion.\u201d<\/p>\n
The business address of mind is called \u201cmonkey mind\u201d, and the home address of the mind is the heart, or heart chakra, Dr. Chaoul said and added that \u201cwe need to cultivate inner peace and find peace within.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dr. Chaoul was glad that Houston will be home to the Eternal Gandhi Museum, which the Dalai Lama has strongly supported in a letter and by the Mayor of Houston.<\/p>\n
Earlier, the program began with a welcome by Rev. Mindy Lawrence of Unity of Houston, followed by an invocation rendered by Marcel Wormsley of the Baha\u2019i Faith.<\/p>\n
Rev Mindy Lawrence, Atul Kothari, Dr. Alejandro Chaoul, Devinder mahajan and Rev. Greg Han lit the lamp and garlanded Gandhi\u2019s portrait.<\/p>\n
The program began with lovely Anusha Sathya, a seventh-grade student from Katy ISD\u2019s Seven Lakes High School as emcee for the event.<\/p>\n
Children of the DAV Montessori School and Sanskriti School, led by Smriti Srivastava, presented a bhajan \u201cInsaaf ki Dagar pe\u2026\u201d reflecting the path of a truth seeker.<\/p>\n
This was followed by Smriti Srivastava and the Swar Sangam group\u2019s presentation of \u201cVaishnava Jana to,\u201d a favorite bhajan of Gandhi, a Bengali song \u201cEkla Chalo Re.\u201d and \u201cRaghupati Raghav Rajaram.\u201d<\/p>\n
Other musical tributes included \u201cAllah & Lab Pe Aati Hai\u201d, a medley by Kamal Haji\u2019s Zikr Band of Ismaili Jamatkhana and it served as a bridge between tradition, culture, and faith.<\/p>\n
Similarly, Anisa and Alma Roshan-Zamir presented devotional music from the Baha\u201di faith.<\/p>\n
Dolly Goyal and her students presented a Bollywood medley and danced to Vaishnava Jana to. Unity\u2019s choir led by Stephanie Bland also paid a musical tribute.<\/p>\n
Dr. Barkat Charania outlined the continuing programs marking the Gandhi sesquicentennial celebration. The year-long celebration was kicked off at Asia Society on Sept. 30, 2018.<\/p>\n
Naresh Sathya, a winner in the Mahatma Gandhi speech contest, gave a rousing speech on the topic \u201cIf I met Gandhi today.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dr. Manish Wani offered a status of the proposed Eternal Gandhi Museum. Land has been acquired at the intersection of Beltway 8 and West Belfort and about $2.5 million of the targeted $8.5 million required for the project has been raised so far. The goal is to open the museum by 2020. Please visit www.eternalgandhi.us to learn more.<\/p>\n
Fort Bend County Judge KP George, who was the guest of honor, while paying homage to Gandhi who propagated non-violence, said he would provide all possible help toward the Eternal Gandhi Museum and would also advocate for including teaching of Gandhi in the school curriculum.<\/p>\n
The Founder of Mahatma Gandhi Library, Atul Kothari provided a perspective on Gandhian philosophy of practicing Truth non-violently and Truth is God.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have varying and different definitions of truth but one\u2019s heart tells what is wrong and right. This is that person\u2019s truth. We have to respect others and respect other belief systems. That brings in tolerance\u201d, Kothari said.<\/p>\n
Kothari also alluded to the concept of suffering even when one has done no wrong. Every mother suffers for her child unconditionally. Gandhi and Martin Luther King followed that principle, Hindu scriptures have similar examples in Prahalad, Mirabai, Dhruv and Harishchandra and Jesus Christ in Christianity. Hate the sin, not the sinner, Kothari pointed out.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Memorial Service Commemorating 70th Death Anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi Mahatma Gandhi Library and Unity of Houston along with Arya Samaj Greater Houston, Jung Center\u2019s Mind Body Spirit Institute, The Ismaili […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2334,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[90],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7597","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-press-releases"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7597","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7597"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7597\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18475,"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7597\/revisions\/18475"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2334"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7597"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egmh.org\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}