BREAKING TEMPLE NEWS: Salt Lake Temple Celebration Theme Announced

Hello again, everyone! This morning, the Salt Lake Temple Celebration theme was officially announced by President Dieter F. Ucthdorf, Acting President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and Chairman of the Salt Lake Temple Celebration Committee, with that theme being Rejoice in Christ. That announcement came from the new West Entrance of the Salt Lake Temple. Rather than doing a detailed recap of that broadcast, I will instead refer any of you who are interested in either watching or reading more about the broadcast to the official Newsroom release I linked to above.

I invite you all to stay tuned here for my coverage of the latest updates from the Church News, Newsroom, and Church of Jesus Christ Temples sites. I’ll be sure to pass word of those along to you all as soon as I learn about them. In the meantime, that does it for now. All comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated on any post at any time, as long as all such feedback is made per the established guidelines. 

I hope any of you who would like to share anything will take your opportunity to “sound off” in the comments below. If you liked what you read here and would like to stay informed of newly added posts and comments, please subscribe to receive the applicable updates. Thank you for the privilege of your time. Until my next post, I wish you all the best and pray that the Lord will bless you all in everything you do.

BREAKING TEMPLE NEWS: Rendering & Groundbreaking Date Released for the Iquitos Peru Temple; Location Released for the Queen Creek Arizona Temple; & Exterior Rendering Released for the Charlotte North Carolina Temple

Hello again, everyone! The First Presidency has made the next major temple announcement, with a rendering and groundbreaking date released for the Iquitos Peru Temple, a site location released for the Queen Creek Arizona Temple, and an exterior rendering released for the Charlotte North Carolina Temple.

Let's get right into the details: We start with the Iquitos Peru Temple. Today's news follows that temple's late January 2024 site announcement, which was preceded by its initial announcement by President Nelson in April 2023. The rendering speaks for itself. Ground will be broken for the Iquitos PeruTemple on Saturday, October 10, 2026, under the presiding direction of Elder Sandino Roman of the South America Northwest Area Presidency. 

Note that this groundbreaking will occur on the same date as the previously-announced groundbreaking for the Maceio Brazil Temple. Because Maceio time is 2 hours ahead of Iquitos, Peru time, the groundbreakings are likely to take place in that order. This announcement puts 2026 temple groundbreakings dead even with temple groundbreakings in 2025, and I have a feeling more groundbreakings are coming down the pike in the near term. The Church would only need to set three more groundbreakings to make that possible.

Since the exterior rendering for the Charlotte, North Carolina Temple also speaks for itself, I will just add that the release of this rendering follows the temple's April 2023 announcement by President Nelson, its original site location announcement in late May 2023, and its adjusted location in late March of this year. Hopefully, with a rendering now released, the groundbreaking for this temple may not be far behind.

That brings us to the details about the Queen Creek Arizona Temple, which will rise on a 15.5-acre site at the southeast corner of Ryan Road and Euell Drive, between Meridian Road to the west and Ironwood Road to the east, in Queen Creek, Arizona. That site location will not only host a multi-story 82,000-square-foot temple, but a meetinghouse and an ancillary building as well. This site confirmation follows the temple's October 2024 announcement. This brings the total number of announced temples with no official ifnroation confirmed down to 43.

I am grateful to have learned of this news and for the chance to share it with you all here. I invite you all to stay tuned here for my coverage of the latest updates from the Church News, Newsroom, and Church of Jesus Christ Temples sites. I’ll be sure to pass word of those along to you all as soon as I learn about them. In the meantime, that does it for now. 

All comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated on any post at any time, as long as all such feedback is made per the established guidelines. I hope any of you who would like to share anything will take your opportunity to “sound off” in the comments below. If you liked what you read here and would like to stay informed of newly added posts and comments, please subscribe to receive the applicable updates. 

Thank you for the privilege of your time. Until my next post, I wish you all the best and pray that the Lord will bless you all in everything you do.

BREAKING TEMPLE NEWS: Opening Arrangements Announced for the Pago Pago American Samoa Temple; Groundbreaking Ceremony Set for the Vienna Austria Temple

Hello again, everyone! About an hour later than usual, the First Presidency officially confirmed the opening arrangements for the Pago Pago American Samoa Temple and the groundbreaking arrangements for the Vienna Austria Temple. There's a lot to get into, so let's dive right in! The media day for the first temple in American Samoa will take place on Monday, November 2, 2026, with invited guests touring the temple the next day. 

The public open house follows from Wednesday, November 4, through Saturday, November 21. The temple's dedication will follow on Sunday, December 13, 2026, under the presiding direction of Elder Quentin L. Cook of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. Contrary to what I had originally theorized, this announcement demonstrates that the Church will still conduct some temple dedications in December. The arrangements make sense, given the smaller size of that temple.

It did occur to me to wonder if the Church might also be able to dedicate the Smithfield Utah Temple before the end of this year as well, but since it is a larger temple and there's no announcement on that dedication yet, Smithfield's dedication will probably take place in January of next year at the earliest. I am grateful we got this temple dedication news today. I have added this dedication to my document showing current apostolic temple dedications during President Oaks' prophetic tenure.

That brings me to the other news: a groundbreaking for the first temple in Austria. That event will take place on Saturday, October 17, 2026, under the presiding direction of Elder Michael Cziesla of the Europe Central Area Presidency. This one is personal to my wife, as she served in what was then the Vienna Austria Mission (which became the Germany Munich/Austria Mission). This groundbreaking will be the seventeenth this year, and there are still plenty of Saturdays left in the year for other groundbreakings. 

So we may yet see 2026 surpass the 20 groundbreakings we saw last year. I'm sure others will be scheduled in the coming weeks. The dedication and groundbreaking are the only updates we got this week, but I was glad to see both of them and to bring you word of them in this post. It'll be interesting to see if other temple updates on the next several Mondays are similarly delayed. But whatever happens in that regard, you can count on my covering it here.

I invite you all to stay tuned here for my coverage of the latest updates from the Church News, Newsroom, and Church of Jesus Christ Temples sites. I’ll be sure to pass word of those along to you all as soon as I learn about them. In the meantime, that does it for now. All comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated on any post at any time, as long as all such feedback is made per the established guidelines. 

I hope any of you who would like to share anything will take your opportunity to “sound off” in the comments below. If you liked what you read here and would like to stay informed of newly added posts and comments, please subscribe to receive the applicable updates. Thank you for the privilege of your time. Until my next post, I wish you all the best and pray that the Lord will bless you all in everything you do.