Ground Is Broken for Boise Temple

December 18 was a chilly day, but the hearts of nearly 5,000 Saints were warmed as they attended groundbreaking ceremonies for a new temple to be built in Boise, Idaho. It was the eighth temple groundbreaking within four months.

The temple is to built on a five-acre lot adjacent to a ward meetinghouse on the west side of the city. Steven S. Mortensen, Regional Representative and chairman of the temple committee, explained that the site is convenient to all members of the temple district—a factor that was foremost in consideration.

Nearly 100,000 members in twenty-nine stakes reside in the temple district, which stretches from the Canadian border on the north to the Idaho-Nevada state line on the south and from Pendleton, Oregon, on the west to Burley, Idaho, on the east. Members in the Boise area have been a part of the Idaho Falls Temple district, a traveling distance of 257 miles.

Elder Mark E. Petersen of the Quorum of the Twelve presided at the ceremonies. “You are among the strong people of the Church and we are indeed grateful for you,” he said to those gathered at the groundbreaking. “We hope and pray that you will make the temple a great place of salvation for you and your ancestors. Use it; do not let it stand idle.”

He reminded members that after they have obtained their own endowments, they are “under solemn obligation to perform ordinances on behalf of our ancestors who have gone to the other side. There is an urgency to receive your own ordinances and an urgency to help the dead who have gone beyond. That is the reason we are here today.”

Raised flower gardens, a fountain, and two hundred trees will enhance the grounds around the Boise Temple. The building’s 112-foot tower will be topped by a statue of the Angel Moroni. Brother Mortensen described the temple as a building “we can be proud of, a building that will be an asset to the city of Boise. Those who enter this fair city must be impressed by its beauty.” The temple is scheduled for completion sometime after 1983.