Hello again, everyone! Today, the Church announced the groundbreakings for two US temples and identified the location of one other. There's a lot to unpack here, so let's get started. With the site for the Bentonville Arkansas Temple having been announced in April of this year, and the site for the McAllen Texas Temple having been announced in December of last year, renderings were released for both temples today, and it was also announced that groundbreakings for both will be held in November of this year, again, with no definitive or specific date clarified.
Elder David A. Bednar, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, will preside over the Bentonville Arkansas Temple groundbreaking remotely. The apostle was the first president of the Bentonville Arkansas Stake after it was split off from the Rogers Arkansas Stake, over which he had been presiding at the time that split occurred. I am not sure how the remote ceremony will work, but I imagine due to local travel restrictions amidst COVID-19, Elder Bednar will offer the prayer to dedicate the site from wherever he will be, and then someone standing in for him (proably an area seventy) will do the actual groundbreaking part of that ceremony. The temple will be a single-story edifice of roughly 25,000 feet, and will share a plot of land with an exisiting meetinghouse.
Meanwhile, for the McAllen Texas Temple, ground will be broken for the single-story edifice of 25,000 feet and an adjacent meetinghouse by Elder Art Rascon, an area seventy living and serving in the greater Houston Texas Area. That groundbreaking will also occur in November. The latest two groundbreakings announced for these temples by the Church will be the twelfth and thirteenth to be held in 2020, leaving a total of 5 temple groundbreakings that will need to occur before the end of this year, as Elder Bednar had indicated would be the case in April. I am grateful for these latest announcements.
Both of those temples were originally announced last year, Bentonville Arkansas in April, and McAllen Texas in October, so two more 2019 temples are out of the queue of those announced. If that was the only temple news, it would be wonderful enough, but the Church has also today identified the site location of and shared the initial details for the Syracuse Utah Temple, which was announced four months ago during the April 2020 General Conference by President Nelson.
Utah's newest temple will be built on a 12-acre site at the corner of 2500 West 1025 South in Syracuse. Plans call for a three-story edifice of roughly 89,000 square feet. Since the plans are stil in the approval phase for that temple, a rendering and groundbreaking information will be announced later. But at least we have a location and initial details for the newest Utah Temple. The latest announcements mean I will once again need to reconsider thoughts I have previously offered in my temple files.
But I am grateful to have learned of these latest developments and to have been able to share them with you all here. I continue to monitor all such updates and Church news developments, and will do my level best to pass word of those along to you all as I become aware of them. That does it for now. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated, on any post at any time, as long as such comments are made in accordance with the established guidelines.
Thank you for the privilege of your time. If you enjoyed what you read here and would like to stay informed of newly added content, please feel free to subscribe. Until my next post, I wish each one of you all the best and pray that the Lord will bless you all in everything you do.
Hi! How are you and your wife healthy? I was seeing the photos of these announced temples, they are beautiful and simple, it seems that it became a tradition not to have the angel Moroni, a very identifying reflection of the Church, a registered trademark.
ReplyDeleteHopefully the construction of all the missing ones will begin, they are needed. It is to be hoped that this pandemic and its effects will pass later, so that the progress and new announcements do not stop.
Omar Valenzuela E
Santiago de Chile
Omar, thank you for stopping by to comment. My wife and I are doing all right. We continue to work with our doctors on our health issues. Thanks for your concern and interest in our welfare. We are plugging along steadily.
DeleteThe Church has been making a lot of temple announcements lately. As Elder Bednar noted last April, the Church hoped to break ground for 18 temples this year. The groundbreakings for the Bentonville Arkansas and McAllen Texas Temple as announced today will bring the total number of temple groundbreakings so far in 2020 to 13, which means there will be 5 left by some point in November. There seem to be at least a few good candidates that could round out the number of temple groundbreakings to 18. It may even be possible for the Church to exceed that goal. It will be interesting to see what happens in that respect.
I think President Nelson has an aggressive plan in place for temple announcements. By the time all currently-scheduled temple groundbreakings occur, the number of announced temples in the current queue will go down to a total of 30. I have a feeling more will be done between now and General Conference to clear the queue further.
In the meantime, thanks again, Omar, for taking time to comment. I always appreciate hearing from you.
Hie James
ReplyDeleteJust saw an announcement in regard to the October general conference. It seems there will be a women's session Saturday evening
Hello, Nigel! Based on your feedback here, I did some digging on my end. I was able to track down a letter from the First Presidency about the upcoming General Conference, which confirms what you said in your comment above. I gave full credit to you for the infromation in the breaking news update I just published here a few minutes ago. Nice to have that confirmed. Thanks for letting me know, as I had not been made aware of that development. I appreciate hearing from you!
DeleteHello again, everyone! Although I am a little late in posting this, I waanted to note the Church News coverage of the latest temple updates as detailed in my post above:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.thechurchnews.com/temples/2020-08-28/bentonville-arkansas-mcallen-texas-syracuse-utah-temples-groundbreakings-renderings-location-191660
With the unexpect4ed timing invovled on the announcement of the groundbreakings for these temples, and the timing of the groundbreakings themselves, I am hopeful we will see other surprise announcements in that respect as well. In the meantime, my thanks once again to you all.