BREAKING TEMPLE NEWS: First Presidency Outlines Procedures for Temples Worldwide to Transition to Phase 4

Hello again, everyone! This afternoon, the Newsroom and the Church News have outlined a new letter from the First Presidency, which sets forth the conditions under which each temple of the Church will gradually and eventually transition to phase 4 (normal operations). Let's break down the details: 

Because immunizations against COVID-19 and its' variants are up worldwide, and since infections, hospitalizations, and deaths are on the downward trend in some parts of the world, the First Presidency is inviting temple presidencies, in consultation with each of the 22 area presidencies worldwide, and with the approval to do so from local medical professionals who shape community guidelines and from the Church's Temple Department, temples of the Church worldwide will gradually be able to transition to phase 4.

Temple presidencies have been invited to look at the best and safest ways to return temple worship to normal pre-pandemic levels. That process and the associated timeline will look different everywhere the Church has established a temple. Obviously, for example, the temples not yet in phase 3 (including the temple in Kyiv Ukraine) will be subject to unique circumstances, which would make the process of reopening temples at full capacity different in Kyiv than it would be elsewhere in Europe.

I anticipated that temples in the US and Canada, where the variants are more controlled, will be opening faster than those temples in, for example, Africa and Europe, where both the variants' effects and unique circumstances of war or other man-made or natural conditions, make opening the temples normally inadvisable for the time being. 

In any case, this is yet another example where the First Presidency is saying that area leaders, medical professionals, temple presidencies, and the Temple Department are better qualified to make these calls than the Brethren at the general level. And it mirrors the process from a few months ago, wherein local stake and ward leaders could, with the approval of the area presidency and medical professionals, determine how and when to return to unrestricted meetings.

Right now, with what is known at the general level, the Church has 8 temples closed for renovation, all of which are in phase 3, allowing members in those districts to schedule phase 3 work at the closest temple available to them. The Kyiv Ukraine Temple was in phase 3 but is paused in view of the ongoing war with Russia (which has seen the destruction of several prominent facilities in Ukraine, but which miraculously has left the temple unaffected). 

One more temple (Suva Fiji) is in phase 1. And with 0 temples currently in phase 2 or 2-B, that leaves the remaining 160 in phase 3 currently. Since the announcement of the eventual transition to phase 4 was not expected this soon, I imagine the Church News might have regular reports available on which temples worldwide have transitioned to phase 4 and are no longer affected by restrictions.

When those changes are available, they will be noted on the temple reopening status tracker, which has not been updated since last Tuesday morning. As I learn about those updates, I will do my level best to pass them along to you all here. I also continue to closely monitor all Church News reports and temple construction updates and will bring word of those to you all here as I become aware of such developments.

In the meantime, 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 feedback offered is consistent with 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. 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.

BREAKING TEMPLE NEWS: All But 1 Temple Now Set to Offer All Living, Proxy Ordinances

Hello again, everyone! This morning, a new report from the Newsroom, verified also by the Church News and through the updated status tracker, indicates that the Barranquilla Colombia Temple, which had been in phase 2-B, is scheduled to transition to phase 3 as early as next Tuesday, March 15. 

This means that, with the exception of the Kyiv Ukraine Temple, for which the closure is still in effect,  the remaining 169 temples in the Church will be in phase 3. With 8 temples closed for major renovations, all 8 temple districts have been designated as open in phase 3. 

1 temple (Kyiv Ukraine) is paused/suspended in its' reopening pending the outcome of the current Russian invasion. 1 temple (Suva Fiji) remains in phase 1. And with 0 in phase 2 or 2-B, the remaining 160 are in phase 3. I am grateful for the Church's thoughtful, thorough, carefully planned, and cautiously coordinated effort to reopen temples. 

While it is uncertain for the present time how soon any temples might transition to phase 4 (normal operations), we have clearly seen the hand of the Lord in what has unfolded within the last 2 years of temple developments. I look forward to seeing what happens in the near and more distant future. In the meantime, I continue to also monitor all Church News updates and will bring word of those to you all 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. I hope any of you who would like to share anything will take your opportunity to “sound off” in the comments below. 

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.

BREAKING TEMPLE NEWS: Groundbreakings Set for Temples in Utah, Idaho, and California; Exterior Rendering Released for Ephraim Utah Temple

An initial brief version of this post was published at 9:15 AM, and additions were subsequently published at 4:45 PM.

Hello again, everyone! In two announcements this morning, groundbreakings were set for 3 more US temples, and an exterior rendering was released for the Ephraim Utah Temple. There is a lot of information to get to, so let's jump right in.  First, with the release of the Ephraim Utah Temple rendering (which follows the October 2021 site announcement, which in turn was preceded by the unexpected May 1 announcement of that temple), we know that the rezoning application has been approved.

While I am not sure what else may need approval before the Church can get a groundbreaking set for that temple, hopefully a groundbreaking for it would occur in August or September, if all goes well. The design of the temple appears to be identical in appearance to other temples of a similar size (39,000 square feet). It will be interesting to see what happens on the timing for the Ephraim Temple.

In the interim, the 3 temples for which groundbreakings have been scheduled are the Burley Idaho, Smithfield Utah, and Yorba Linda California Temples. Here are the details: The Burley Idaho Temple groundbreaking will be conducted on June 4, under the direction of Elder Brent H. Nielson of the Presidency of the Seventy, who may have direct supervision of the North America Central Area, and who was born in that city. 

I love the fact that the Church calls upon those with personal connections to areas getting a temple to presie at the groundbreakings for the temples in those areas. The announcement of the groundbreaking for Burley was preceded by the release of its' site location on June 23 of last year, followed by the release of the exterior rendering on September 17.  

As an additional note, since the last scheduled groundbreaking was Elko Nevada on May 7, the fact that the Burley groundbreaking will occur 4 weeks after that may point to the Church trying to get other temple groundbreakings done between May 7 and June 4. Among the most likely candidates could be the Belo Horizonte Brazil, Ephraim Utah, Willamette Valley Oregon, Cali Colombia, Torreon Mexico, and Greater Guatemala City Guatemala Temples. 

Any of those 6 could have groundbreakings in the 4 intervening weeks (May 14, 21, and 28, and June 11). I'm adding June 11 because today's announcement does not list any groundbreakings on that date. The other two temples, Smithfield Utah and Yorba Linda California, are both set to have their groundbreakings on Saturday June 11.   

Utah's newest temple groundbreaking will be under the direction of Elder Quentin L. Cook of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and a Cache Valley native, who will be accompanied by his apostolic colleague and another Cache Valley son, Elder Gary E. Stevenson.  This temple's groundbreaking follows its' June 10 site announcement. 

An exterior rendering for the Smithfield Utah Temple was released on November 24, at the same time the Church released the new rendering for the reconstructed Provo Utah Temple. Meanwhile, the Yorba Linda California Temple groundbreaking will also occur on June 18, with Elder Mark A. Bragg, the president of the North America West Area who was born in nearby Los Angeles, presiding thereat.

The announcement follows the July 15 site announcement and the September 17 release of the exterior rendering. This means that, for the first time ever, the Church has 9 temple groundbreakings set to take place between March and June of this year. This brings the total number of temples set to have a groundbreaking thus far to 9. 

The Church's ninth groundbreaking in 2021 was held on September 18 for the Phnom Pehn Camobida Temple, so with the ninth groundbreaking in 2022 taking place a full 3 months earlier than last year, I don't think it's out of the question that the Church could hold 20 or more groundbreakings this year. With that in mind, I wanted to provide an updated look at groundbreakings in 2021 vs. this year.

August-December seems to be the most likely time we will see quite a few groundbreakings for temples in the southern hemisphere, and may also be the window within which ground is broken for the Tarawa Kiribati, Port Vila Vanuatu, and Port Moresby Papua New Guinea Temples. Hopefully action can be taken on other temples in Asia, Africa, and Europe. 

And given that last year marked the clearing of the queue of the remaining temples originally announced by President Monson, and the Church has already cleared the queue of all temples originally announced in October 2019, hopefully at least 4 of the 5 remaining which were announced between April 2018 and April 2019 might get cleared from the queue as well soon.

The status and timing of the Russia temple might depend on how the current increasingly dangerous and volatile situation with the attack on Ukraine. I continue to keep my eyes open for all such developments and Church news updates and will bring you all word thereof as those updates are released.

In the meantime, 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. I hope any of you who would like to share anything will take your opportunity to “sound off” in the comments below. 

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.

BREAKING TEMPLE NEWS: Public Open House; Dedication Announced for Praia Cape Verde Temple

Hello again, everyone! As reported by the Newsroom and the Church News, in the last few minutes, the First Presidency announced the open house and dedication dates for the Praia Cape Verde Temple. Let's break down the details. Open house tours will be held from Saturday May 21-Saturday June 11, 2022, excluding the relevant Sundays of May 22 and 29 and June 5.

A youth devotional will take place on Saturday June 18, followed by the temple's dedication on Sunday June 19, 2022, in three sessions, which will be held at 9:00 AM, 12:00 PM, and 3:00 PM. Elder Neil L. Andersen of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles will preside over the dedicatory events. This continues the tradition of President Nelson delegating temple dedications to his fellow apostles. 

This marks the second temple to be dedicated by Elder Andersen, following the mid-September 2019 dedication of the Lisbon Portugal Temple.  For perspective, the dedication times line up with Utah time as follows: When the 9:00 AM session is held, it will be 3:00 AM here in Utah, with the 12:00 PM session held at 6:00 AM Utah time, and the 3:00 PM session held at 9:00 AM Sunday here.

This announcement also means that, barring anything unexpected, the Church will dedicate this temple before dedicating the Quito Ecuador Temple. Of course, since the Yigo Guam Temple will be dedicated on Sunday May 22, we could see other temple dedications/rededications held between that time and the dedication of this temple.

It will be interesting to see what the timing is on this. I would also mention that, although Quito, Brazil, New Zealand, and Japan are at phase 4 Do Not Travel alerts, there are certain conditions that allow such travel and entry. Temple dedications or rededications may be an exception to the rule, since there may be no limits on religious gatherings.  

Anyways, given the almost four-week gap between the dedications for the Yigo Guam and Praia Cape Verde Temples, there may be hopes to dedicate the Hamilton or Tokyo temples in early June. It's also possible that the Church is keeping an eye on conditions in Ecuador to schedule the Quito dedication.

Whatever happens in that regard, I will be sure to bring word of those developments to you as I become aware thereof. I am hopeful that tomorrow the Church might announce more groundbreakings. But I will keep my eyes open for all such temple updates and major Church news and pass those along as well.

In the meantime, 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.

I hope any of you who would like to share anything will take your opportunity to “sound off” in the comments below.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.

Clarification on My General Conference Predictions

Hello again, everyone! As some of you might be aware, beginning about 2 years ago, I somehow inadvertently offended someone on Wikipedia. As a result of that, since that time, I have been harassed both on and off Wikipedia, most notably by trolls who continue to this day to use phony accounts on Wikipedia to harass me or generally make nuisances of themselves. Unfortunately, whoever is behind those efforts is very clever, and is using multiple false accounts of various names.

A few of them have even attempted to spoof names of some of my fellow editors, or by using the names of various general leaders of the Church. The names change, but the abuse by those who operate those accounts is the same. As a result, I have had to take some drastic measures on Wikipedia (including having several others keep their eyes out for those types of accounts in the history of pages I visit) and trying to be more discerning with the comments on this blog. 

2 days ago, I had a new comment posted here by President Russell M. Nelson To my knowledge, the senior Brethren of the Church haven't habitually followed personal blogs, and have never commented on them, which is understandable given the heavy loads they carry. Something about the comment didn't seem right, and given the fact that the names of senior apostles in the Church had been invoked in user accounts on Wikipedia to disrupt page content, I had to make a quick call about whether to keep it or not. At the time, I deleted it because something about it didn't seem right to me.

But if it was a genuine comment from the prophet, then it should be retained here in some form. I am posting a copy of the comment, just in case it is genuine, along with some additional information from me. President Nelson, if that really was a genuine comment from you, I apologize if I was unnecessarily suspicious of it, and I hope that the explanation that follows this reproduction of that comment might be illuminating to you and to all my other readers:

So, at 10:02 AM on February 25, 2022, at 10:02 AM, President Russell M. Nelson posted the following comment:

"Please do not make predictions about the upcoming General Conferences. You are not in a position to know what decisions may or may not be made. Do no make predictions about matters that you cannot possibly know about.

"When I was a heart surgeon, it was always dangerous to make predictions about what may or may not happen in a surgery. It's even more dangerous to make unfounded predictions about spiritual matters. You might lead new converts to trust in your opinion, instead of following the prophet. I know that you love the Lord and His Church too much to continue to do that.

"Thank you for your thoughtful, faith inspiring blog. In my 97 years, I've never seen a better example of a faithful Latter-day Saint.

"Sincerely,

"President Russell M. Nelson"

I bolded the errors which I believe point to this being a troll omment rather than a genuine one from the prophet, on which grounds I deleted that comment. 

But if it was genuine, I appreciate the kind words offered. Some of the things said reminded me of what the Prophet Joseph Smith said about the destiny of the Church being something the other men of his day knew no more about than a babe on its' mother's lap. At the same time, I have been creating such predictions for my own personal use since around 2007, and have publicly posted them since turning this blog's focus from personal updates to being almost completely focused on the Church. 

The point is valid: In general, I have no idea what decisions have been/will be made, who will speak and when they might do so, what changes will be made in general Church leadership, what the statistical report for 2021 might look like, or the full list of locations for which the Church will announce a temple in April. 

So for me to suggest in any way that each set of predictions will be 100% accurate would be foolish on my part. At the same time, beginning with the General Conferences held under President Hinckley, each General Conference followed specific patterns that were fairly easily analyzed so that a general framework for each subsequent conference emerged. 

Based on those patterns, I started keeping files of multiple documents relating to the general leaders of the Church. At a glance, I can give information on which members of the First Presidency conducted and spoke at any General Conference from April 1995 through now. I also track the most recent conferences in which each current member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles has spoken in each General Conference session. 

And I have other documents showing information about the first time each current GA Seventy spoke in each General Conference, and when each GA Seventy last did so. That information has similarly been compiled for members of the current Presidency of the Seventy and the Presiding Bishopric. I've also tracked information about the speaking history for General Officers of the Church during President Nelson, and the particulars of each Women's Session in terms of who has conducted and spoken at each. As President Nelson reminded us in 2018, "Good inspiration is based on good information."

Based on the data in those files, which continues to expand, I have a rough idea of which leaders are likely to speak and when. But I have never once been 100% accurate on that, so I hope no one is taking those projections as gospel. The prophet is the one who ultimately discerns who speaks when and for how long, under the inspiration of the Spirit. 

And quite honestly, the process of predicting the speakers has been even more challenging under President Nelson, who has given us 8 General Conferences thus far that have each uniquely differed from the "usual patterns" I noticed in General Conferences overseen by Presidents Hinckley and Monson. 

As such, they should not at all be taken as gospel, and anyone who puts their faith in those or in myself as the predictor thereof is misguided. I have found myself paying even more attention to General Conferences since President Nelson became the prophet because, even with my best projections, I'm bound to be surprised multiple times over that one weekend. 

Similarly, I have never been fully accurate in predicting the changes in general Church leadership or the exact figures on the statistical report.  And I've been clear about the fact that some of the temples being announced caught me off guard. Temples for India, Russia, mainland China, and the Middle East were announced long before I thought that would ever happen. And Vitoria Brazil last time wasn't anywhere on my radar. 

Having linked to the files of information I keep for General Conferences, I hope that helps explain my process more thoroughly.  Let me clearly state this again: I have no inside sourcing or special access to inside information that would qualify me to pass off these predictions as anywhere close to doctrinally correct. If I were to attempt to do so, and someone was led away from the Church because of such assertions, I'd stand accountable before the Lord for that in the final judgment. 

I am just as likely to be wrong about any of these predictions as I am to be right. And I will gratefully and joyfully report any flaws in my thinking as they are proven to be incorrect. Anyways, hope this explanation is helpful to all who read it. I still am not sure whether that comment was genuinely from the prophet or not, and although I have my doubts, I am honored by the thought that he might have weighed in here. 

I hope no one who reads my blog here is taking my thoughts on this as having any authority of any kind because that's not the case. What I do is the best research I'm capable of, followed by waiting to find out if anything I have predicted is correct. With that said, I invite us all to tune in to General Conference to see how accurate I might be. 

In the meantime, 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 adhere to the 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. 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.