There is the God that can't be seen. And there is the God that can. Hindus visit their temples to see God. And be seen by him. Whether it's a statue of the warrior goddess Durga, the ever popular goddess of prosperity, Lakshmi, with her handsome husband, Vishnu, or the powerful South Indian deity Vel, Hindu families come bearing their gifts of coconuts, flowers, rupees, bananas, or whatever is on hand to offer God or Goddess that day.
The priest draws aside the gate that separates the worshipper from the image, and the family members gaze into the eyes of their beloved deity. This is the process of darshan, which means "sight". You see your beloved deity. He or she sees you. A connection is made. A blessing is rendered.
Yet, in spite of what my Sunday school teacher taught me, in all my travels through India from one end of the subcontinent to the other, I have never met a image in the temple is God. In fact, if the "idol" dump it in the river! That's a petty unceremonious way to treat God, don't you think?
If you look through a telescope, you can clearly see the planets. Yet no one thinks the telescope is actually Mars. The "idols" in the temples, called murtis in India, are telescopes to help us see God and goddess closer, comes so near we can reach out and touch the divine feet.
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