Religion and Belief

Venerable Vicheth Chum and Yav Socchea

Venerable Vicheth Chum (left) with Yav Socchea, the architect Watt Munisotaram, inside the temple with one of Socchea's designs on April 7, 2017. Photo by Will Yetvin.

Yanat Chhith

Yanat Chhith, the vice president of Watt Munisotaram, outside the temple on July 9, 2017.

Watt Munisotaram—the only Cambodian Buddhist temple in Minnesota and the largest in the US—sits on a forty-acre rural site about thirty minutes south of St. Paul. Although its founding organization, the Minnesota Cambodian Buddhist Society, was established in 1982, it was not until 2007 that members consecrated a temple on forty acres of their own land.

Painting Buddhas inside Watt Munisotaram

A monk and a volunteer paint Buddha statues inside Watt Munisotaram. Photo by Will Yetvin, April 8, 2016.

Housing for monks at Watt Munisotaram

Watt Munisotaram's original temple building and housing, used after construction of the larger temple (2007) primarily as housing for monks living on the site full time. Photo by Will Yetvin, April 17, 2016.

Visakha Puja celebration

Attendees at a celebration held at Watt Munisotaram during the Buddhist festival of Visahka Puja (Vesak). Photograph by Jonah Hudson-Erdman, May 20, 2016.