The Manti Utah Temple is the second pioneer-era temple to be completed and ready for rededication after President Nelson’s April 2019 announcement.
The First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ has announced dedication and open house dates for the Manti Utah Temple, the second of the Church’s pioneer-era houses of the Lord ready for rededication following recent renovations.
The rededication is scheduled for Sunday, April 21, 2024, and will be broadcast to all units within the temple district. Additional information regarding the rededication — including times of sessions and who will be presiding — will be announced at a future date.
Prior to the rededication, a public open house will be conducted from Thursday, March 14, through Friday, April 5, excluding Sundays. A media day will be held Monday, March 11, with invited guests touring the temple March 11-14.
The announcement of the dates were published Monday, Nov. 20, on ChurchofJesusChrist.org.
On May 1, 2021, President Nelson announced plans to preserve “the pioneer craftsmanship, artwork and character” of the Manti temple — as well as plans to construct a second temple in Utah’s Sanpete Valley in the city of Ephraim. A closure date of Oct. 1, 2021, was set to start the multiyear renovations.
Church leaders announced plans to construct the Manti temple June 25, 1875. Church President Brigham Young broke ground April 25, 1877, and President Wilford Woodruff, then president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and later the Church’s fourth president, dedicated the temple on May 21, 1888. “Show favor unto all who have helped to forward this work by good wishes, good words or good deeds,” he prayed.
Almost a century later, in June 1985, President Gordon B. Hinckley, then a counselor in the First Presidency, rededicated the temple following renovation. Asking the Lord to sanctify the temple, he prayed that “all who will enter it through the years to come, may feel the presence of Thy Spirit and recognize that they are in holy precincts.”
The Manti temple was the Church of Jesus Christ’s fifth constructed in the latter days and third-oldest still in operation. The Kirtland Temple is owned by the Community of Christ, and the original Nauvoo Temple was left behind by the Saints who were forced to migrate to the Salt Lake Valley; it was later destroyed by fire and a tornado.
Temples in Utah were later built and dedicated — in order — in St. George, Logan, Manti and Salt Lake City before the end of the 19th century.