Hello again, everyone! Breaking temple news has just been reported by the Church. The opening dates have been announced for the Pocatello Idaho Temple Given the fact that COVID-19 transmission rates have been considerably lowered and that vaccination numbers are up in Idaho, it is fully safe for the Church to plan this temple opening. And barring something extremely miraculous, I imagine that this may be the first temple dedication, if not the first temple reopening, for this year.
I say that because regardless of what happens with COVID-19 elsewhere, New Zealand also has the virus well under control, and that could mean the Hamilton temple will be the first to reopen after the pandemic. As I've previously observed, when the Church has set temple dedications in the past, it's not unheard of for rededications to be subseuqnetly announcced and scheduled to occur before temple dedications. My gut feeling is that the Church may be able to rededicate the Hamlton Temple in the weeks after the October 2021 General Conference, but we will see what happens there.
Either way, this officially bumps the Pocatello Idaho Temple ahead in the queue of both Rio de Janeiro Brazil and Winnipeg Manitoba, and I wouldn't be shocked if Winnipeg were scheduled wither for the end of this year or early next year. From what I understand, Brazil is still a mess in terms of the pandemic, so it could be the early months of next year before the Rio de Janeiro temple is finally able to reopen. But determinations on both temples, or any of those for which renovations have been completed, will come at another time. With those preliminary musings out of the way, let's jump right into the details on the opening arrangements for Pocatello.
The temple in that city will host public tours in the open house, which will occur from Saturday September 19-Saturday October 23, with the obvious exception of the dates for the relevant Sundays and General Conference weekend. The specific dates on which tours will not occur are September 19 and 26, and October 2-3, 10, and 17. Following the conclusion of the temple open house and a 2-week final cleaning of the temple, a yoouth devotional will be held on the evening of Saturday November 6, followed by the dedicated on Sunday Novembeer 7 by Acting President M. Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. There will be three dedcatory sessions for that temple, which will be held at 9:00 AM, 12:00 PM, and 3:00 PM.
Barring anything unexpected, the Pocatello Idaho Temple will thus become the 169th operating temple of the Churb. I continue to monitor all Church news and updates and will be sure to pass along that informaton to you all here as I become aware thereof.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.
