Hello again, everyone! This afternoon, the First Presidency officially announced the groundbreaking ceremony for the Naga Philippines Temple, which will take place on Saturday, August 8, 2026, with Elder Steven D. Shumway of the Philippines Area Presidency presiding thereover. The groundbreaking announcement follows the temple's announcement in October 2022, and the temple's site announcement and exterior rendering release in February of this year,
This will be the second temple to have a groundbreaking in August, following the August 1 groundbreaking for the Santos Brazil Temple that was announced last Tuesday. I hope that these back-to-back groundbreaking announcements that have taken place over the last two weeks, with their ceremonies also coming on back-to-back Saturdays, will be the beginning of a potential string of week-by-week groundbreaking announcements followed by week-by-week ceremonies.
I also wouldn't be shocked if the Church announces multiple groundbreakings in the coming weeks, whether or not they have more than one announced per week. With this announcement, the Church has scheduled the ninth groundbreaking for 2026. By the second week in August of last year, the Church had 12 groundbreakings take place. So hopefully 2026 can eventually keep pace with (or surpass) 2025 in temple groundbreaking. I am grateful for today's announcement and the opportunity 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.