Why so many new temples, up 70 under pres nelson 3.5 year tenure when membership flat. Why?

[Duncan]

7 hours ago, JustAnAustralian said:

Kevin R Duncan, GA70 & executive director of the temple department has answered this.

 

Now that the subject has come up, The Toronto Ontario Temple, is not really even in Toronto, it's in Brampton but it's not used much so while it would be nice to have another one there I doubt it. I found out that the temple president here is going to be helping with the vaccination effort, he's a retired dentist so that is what he'll be doing until whenever whatever happens I guess!

[Amulek]

12 hours ago, webbles said:

To spend the rainy day fund

Seriously, I find it fascinating when people like Janna Riess complain about the church having so much money and then turn right around and complain about the church actually spending money according to its core principles.

 

[Teancum]

13 hours ago, Fair Dinkum said:

You get a temple and you get a temple and you get a temple in fact everybody gets a temple  

 

 

https://religionnews.com/2021/05/20/why-so-many-new-mormon-temples-when-lds-growth-is-flat/

I was going to start a thread on this but you beat me to it. Thanks!

[Teancum]

13 hours ago, teddyaware said:

To perplex, mystify and annoy doubters.

To keep the true believers happy and stupid.

[Teancum]

12 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

To make the temple available to as many members as possible and to facilitate travel in case things in the world go awry.

So in Europe, and let's tale Norway, you have 4600 members. And likely less than 30% are active and even less temple worthy.  This temple will sit empty most of the time. Other areas maybe your idea is correct. But not for a whole bunch of them.

[Fair Dinkum]

5 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said:

Nonsense, Dr Nelson has better sense than to expose everyone unnecessarily to COVID-19.  Your politics are showing.

The Nauvoo Temple, for example.  Some years back I drove into Nauvoo, rented a motel room, and looked around.  There were about 200 LDS missionaries in town, all very helpful.  That evening I got on my laptop and prepared about 15 ancestors for complete temple work the next day.  Went to the local public library to print out the order (with bar code), which was run by a missionary.  Then went to the temple.  A wonderfully beautiful edifice.  Maybe the first time since 1844-45 that a member of my family had been back to Nauvoo.

I started in the basement at the baptismal font, where I found a member of my stake presidency with his extended family doing the same thing I was.  Got everyone baptized and confirmed, then moved on up.  With the help of temple missionaries, all were endowed, sealed, etc., by the time I had finished the one name I had done on my own.  I was so gratified.

I suspect that the LDS Church is in this for the long haul, not for a Hollywood moment.

This seriously brought a tear to my eye.  What a wonderful experience for you Robert.  If the temple does nothing more, it does connect us to our roots and helps us honor and pay tribute to those who made all of those sacrifices and made it possible for us to reap the dividends of that sacrifice.   We are the beneficiaries of those who came before us. This is one take away I cherish and celebrate.

[mgy401]

30 minutes ago, Teancum said:

So in Europe, and let's tale Norway, you have 4600 members. And likely less than 30% are active and even less temple worthy.  This temple will sit empty most of the time. Other areas maybe your idea is correct. But not for a whole bunch of them.

Meh.  The alternative is at least thirteen hundred tithe-paying, covenant-keeping Church members having to travel out-of-country to the far side of Sweden every time they want to go to a temple.

We can afford it; we may as well do it.

In the context of the last eighteen months, this is a rather amusing discussion.  Then it was “how DARE the Church accrue all this wealth and not spend it!”  Now it’s “how DARE the Church spend some of its wealth in a way that only benefits a couple thousand members!”  

Edited May 21, 2021 by mgy401

[Fair Dinkum]

24 minutes ago, Teancum said:

So in Europe, and let's tale Norway, you have 4600 members. And likely less than 30% are active and even less temple worthy.  This temple will sit empty most of the time. Other areas maybe your idea is correct. But not for a whole bunch of them.

I visited the Copenhagen Temple several years ago.  It was empty. Only my wife and I in the endowment + a few old workers. One of the strangest temple experiences ever.  I felt sorry for the temple workers but I got the sense that they were actually happy to have someone other then themselves go through a session.

[jkwilliams]

12 minutes ago, Fair Dinkum said:

I visited the Copenhagen Temple several years ago.  It was empty. Only my wife and I in the endowment + a few old workers. One of the strangest temple experiences ever.  I felt sorry for the temple workers but I got the sense that they were actually happy to have someone other then themselves go through a session.

I read years ago that the church is following a sort of "if you build it, they will come" program wherein you establish a presence in a country or community by having a physical presence (a temple or a chapel, for example) that provides a footprint much larger than the actual number of members in the area. This is done with the expectation that said presence will attract attention, and attention prepares people for receiving the gospel. A church leader expressed something similar to this when I noted that the church was engaged in a massive building campaign in Bolivia (57 chapels in a single year) at a time when existing chapels were nearly empty most Sundays. 

Obviously, I have no idea if that's the case, but that kind of makes sense. 

[Teancum]

9 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

The number of temples is not a reflection of raw membership totals. It’s a reflection of the membership worldwide who are faithful and devout enough to qualify for a temple recommend. An ever increasing number of temples might thus be regarded as a measure of real growth, or the growth in the number of members for whom the Church makes a positive difference in their lives. 
 

Furthermore, temples are not just for the living, but for the dead as well. Making temples more convenient and accessible to living members facilitates the saving ordinances being offered to ever-increasing numbers of those who have passed beyond the veil without having those blessings in mortality. 

If you are correct how do you explain the temples in Europe where the member count is abysmally low and the activity rate of those counts are even lower. In Norway my bet is you maybe have 500 TR holders if even. 4600 members, 30% or less activity rate leaves us 1380 active members. You need almost half those to be TR holders. I think that temple will sit empty most of the time but for temple missionaries who may spend their days doin ordinance work.

[jkwilliams]

Just now, Teancum said:

If you are correct how do you explain the temples in Europe where the member count is abysmally low and the activity rate of those counts are even lower. In Norway my bet is you maybe have 500 TR holders if even. 4600 members, 30% or less activity rate leaves us 1380 active members. You need almost half those to be TR holders. I think that temple will sit empty most of the time but for temple missionaries who may spend their days doin ordinance work.

In my experience outside of Utah, there's a predictable pattern: a new temple is crowded for a few months, and then the novelty kind of wears off. We used to attend the Houston temple every Tuesday evening, and it was empty except for us and maybe 4 or 5 elderly women. We knew the ordinance workers by name, and they knew us. They would have to bring in extra ordinance workers for certain parts of the ceremony. I thought for a while that it must be just that we were going on Tuesdays, but other times, when we had assignments to go on a Friday or Saturday, it was still largely empty.

As I said, I was told by church leaders (both in and outside of the COB) that it was more to establish a presence, whether it was used or not. 

[Fair Dinkum]

2 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

I read years ago that the church is following a sort of "if you build it, they will come" program wherein you establish a presence in a country or community by having a physical presence (a temple or a chapel, for example) that provides a footprint much larger than the actual number of members in the area. This is done with the expectation that said presence will attract attention, and attention prepares people for receiving the gospel. A church leader expressed something similar to this when I noted that the church was engaged in a massive building campaign in Bolivia (57 chapels in a single year) at a time when existing chapels were nearly empty most Sundays. 

Obviously, I have no idea if that's the case, but that kind of makes sense. 

I think Europe is a lost cause to not only Mormonism but religion in general as an intellectual enterprise.  Any dollars spent in Europe on new temples, in my view, is strictly for PR and to serve the Mormon tourist crowd. Take Rome as an example,  It's a must stop site for the recommend holding members touring Italy.  I have friends that went there instead of Pompeii.  Imagine that.

[Teancum]

28 minutes ago, mgy401 said:

Meh.  The alternative is at least thirteen hundred tithe-paying, covenant-keeping Church members having to travel out-of-country to the far side of Sweden every time they want to go to a temple.

We can afford it; we may as well do it.

In the context of the last eighteen months, this is a rather amusing discussion.  Then it was “how DARE the Church accrue all this wealth and not spend it!”  Now it’s “how DARE the Church spend some of its wealth in a way that only benefits a couple thousand members!”  

Hey I could not care less how the Church spends its money. I don't give it tithing anymore though I am sure some of the many hundreds of thousands I gave in tithing over the years sits in the Ensign Peak mammoth wealth accumulation fund.  If they want to blow the money on a man made edifice rather than use it to bless living humans so be it. 

 

Just don't pretend that these temple announcements mean the LDS Church is growing much. It is not. But the fanny in the pew members sure think that such temple announcements mean it is growing. And my guess is the leaders are hoping that is the case. And of course a temple in a local area may help bring in more $$ in tithing so in some areas the temple may be a revenue generator. Good business move if to ROI justifies it.

[rongo]

10 hours ago, pogi said:

Are you suggesting that our prophet is lying, or at least not genuine in his urgency for the work?

He did not tell the truth about local regulations being the hold-up to temple work resuming. Almost no places have capacity or other limits on church services. The minute he said that, we all looked at each other, and said, "They could all be open tomorrow" (or Tuesday, since the temples aren't open on Mondays  ), but it becomes increasingly obvious with the passing months as one monitors the "phases" that temples aren't even close to opening up to normal volume and capacity. And, this is increasingly not reflective of the Covid situation, either, and will be more so with each passing week/month. 

Lip service is paid to urgency, but nothing says "urgency" about the Church's actions with the temple. Unfortunately.  

[Teancum]

9 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

In my experience outside of Utah, there's a predictable pattern: a new temple is crowded for a few months, and then the novelty kind of wears off. We used to attend the Houston temple every Tuesday evening, and it was empty except for us and maybe 4 or 5 elderly women. We knew the ordinance workers by name, and they knew us. They would have to bring in extra ordinance workers for certain parts of the ceremony. I thought for a while that it must be just that we were going on Tuesdays, but other times, when we had assignments to go on a Friday or Saturday, it was still largely empty.

As I said, I was told by church leaders (both in and outside of the COB) that it was more to establish a presence, whether it was used or not. 

Same where I live. 

[rongo]

1 hour ago, Teancum said:

So in Europe, and let's tale Norway, you have 4600 members. And likely less than 30% are active and even less temple worthy.  This temple will sit empty most of the time. Other areas maybe your idea is correct. But not for a whole bunch of them.

 

33 minutes ago, Fair Dinkum said:

I visited the Copenhagen Temple several years ago.  It was empty. Only my wife and I in the endowment + a few old workers. One of the strangest temple experiences ever.  I felt sorry for the temple workers but I got the sense that they were actually happy to have someone other then themselves go through a session.

 

17 minutes ago, Teancum said:

f you are correct how do you explain the temples in Europe where the member count is abysmally low and the activity rate of those counts are even lower. In Norway my bet is you maybe have 500 TR holders if even. 4600 members, 30% or less activity rate leaves us 1380 active members. You need almost half those to be TR holders. I think that temple will sit empty most of the time but for temple missionaries who may spend their days doin ordinance work.

I agree (cf. my first post in this thread). My son returns from Norway in June, and many Norwegians also agree that the temple will sit empty. But so did Copenhagen, Stockholm, and Helsinki. 

I still think much of this is marketing/branding, regardless of how unused they are. 

20 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

I read years ago that the church is following a sort of "if you build it, they will come" program wherein you establish a presence in a country or community by having a physical presence (a temple or a chapel, for example) that provides a footprint much larger than the actual number of members in the area. This is done with the expectation that said presence will attract attention, and attention prepares people for receiving the gospel. A church leader expressed something similar to this when I noted that the church was engaged in a massive building campaign in Bolivia (57 chapels in a single year) at a time when existing chapels were nearly empty most Sundays. 

Yep. 

14 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

In my experience outside of Utah, there's a predictable pattern: a new temple is crowded for a few months, and then the novelty kind of wears off. We used to attend the Houston temple every Tuesday evening, and it was empty except for us and maybe 4 or 5 elderly women. We knew the ordinance workers by name, and they knew us. They would have to bring in extra ordinance workers for certain parts of the ceremony. I thought for a while that it must be just that we were going on Tuesdays, but other times, when we had assignments to go on a Friday or Saturday, it was still largely empty.

As I said, I was told by church leaders (both in and outside of the COB) that it was more to establish a presence, whether it was used or not. 

I think this is the case with almost all new temples.  

[ksfisher]

1 minute ago, rongo said:

I still think much of this is marketing/branding, regardless of how unused they are. 

Perhaps it's about trying to diminish the travel burden placed on the saints in Norway as they do their best to make and keep sacred covenants.

[Bob Crockett]

I've read several propheciies over the years from B Young about how temples will fill the earth.  Temple worship is simply an element of LDS liturgy.   There will likely be one in every metropolitan area in the world.  I remember attending a session in Recife Brazil in the middle the week.  The temple was at more than 50% full.   Somebody's interested.  

It wasn't always like that.  It used to be that there was no proxy work for anything other than baptisms for the dead. It was like that for decades.  I think things changed in the 1920s.  

[webbles]

11 hours ago, rongo said:

When?  Despite saying in conference that they will open when local regulations allow, none are back to pre-Covid capacity and volume. Only a handful in the world are even open for partial vicarious work. If it really were local regulations, temples would be open and operating right now. Despite saying this, it isn't local regulations holding them back, it is internal Church regulations. 

Per https://churchofjesuschristtemples.org/news/closures/

Quote

• Phase 1: Living husband-and-wife sealings by appointment  |  4 Temples
• Phase 2: Open for all living ordinances only with restrictions  |  41 Temples
• Phase 2-B: Open for all living ordinances and proxy baptisms with restrictions  |  83 Temples
• Phase 3: Open for all ordinances with restrictions  |  27 Temples
• Phase 4: Open for full operations  |  0 Temples
• Paused: Temple reopened but temporarily reclosed  |  4 Temples

83 has partial vicarious work and I think that is more than a handful.  27 have full vicarious work with appointments.

Less than 1/3 of the temples are not doing vicarious work.

[jkwilliams]

19 minutes ago, ksfisher said:

Perhaps it's about trying to diminish the travel burden placed on the saints in Norway as they do their best to make and keep sacred covenants.

Probably. I don't think anyone is criticizing how the church spends its money on temples (at least I'm not), but clearly the reason to build a temple isn't necessarily "real growth."

[mgy401]

22 minutes ago, Teancum said:

Hey I could not care less how the Church spends its money. I don't give it tithing anymore though I am sure some of the many hundreds of thousands I gave in tithing over the years sits in the Ensign Peak mammoth wealth accumulation fund.  If they want to blow the money on a man made edifice rather than use it to bless living humans so be it. 

 

Just don't pretend that these temple announcements mean the LDS Church is growing much. It is not. But the fanny in the pew members sure think that such temple announcements mean it is growing. And my guess is the leaders are hoping that is the case. And of course a temple in a local area may help bring in more $$ in tithing so in some areas the temple may be a revenue generator. Good business move if to ROI justifies it.

I daresay that the Church’s definition of “bless[ing] living humans” is perhaps more broad than yours.   And really, I doubt even you are quite as hostile to spending money on houses of worship as your post suggests (surely you didn’t oppose the restoration of Notre Dame after its fire?).  I would venture to guess that your position is primarily that, as an objective fact, Mormons should not consider access to their own temples to be the sort of “blessing” that merits a pecuniary sacrifice.

I don’t think any Mormon who’s been paying attention, still has any delusion that the raw membership numbers of the Church are still spectacularly growing.  Retention, of course, is another matter.  The impression I do have is that Churchwide convert retention is improving; which I find quite believable (my Latin-American mission’s six-month retention when I was serving in 2000-2001 got up to 25% at one point, and the muckety-mucks told us we were doing extraordinarily well).

And of course, the other facet is that Mormonism has this sort of mystical belief that the mere presence of a temple is a setback to the powers of darkness in some not-exactly-objectively-quantifiable way; which is how I have understood most of President Nelson’s rhetoric regarding temples.

[Duncan]

35 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

In my experience outside of Utah, there's a predictable pattern: a new temple is crowded for a few months, and then the novelty kind of wears off. We used to attend the Houston temple every Tuesday evening, and it was empty except for us and maybe 4 or 5 elderly women. We knew the ordinance workers by name, and they knew us. They would have to bring in extra ordinance workers for certain parts of the ceremony. I thought for a while that it must be just that we were going on Tuesdays, but other times, when we had assignments to go on a Friday or Saturday, it was still largely empty.

As I said, I was told by church leaders (both in and outside of the COB) that it was more to establish a presence, whether it was used or not. 

I remember just after the temple was announced for here we had Elder Shayne Bowen attend Stake Conference and he told us this exact thing, basically don't let the novelty wear off. I remember 15 years ago then Elder Eyring saying that you shoot a cannon in some Utah temples and you wouldn't hit anyone! obviously you shouldn't but if you did!

[jkwilliams]

Just now, Duncan said:

I remember just after the temple was announced for here we had Elder Shayne Bowen attend Stake Conference and he told us this exact thing, basically don't let the novelty wear off. I remember 15 years ago then Elder Eyring saying that you shoot a cannon in some Utah temples and you wouldn't hit anyone! obviously you shouldn't but if you did!

When we were about to move away from Houston, the area presidency started a "fill the temple" program where each ward in each stake was supposed to assign enough patrons to fill every session and perform every ordinance for 3 days (IIRC). The message was pretty clear: without direct assignments, the temple wasn't being used. 

[Duncan]

Just now, jkwilliams said:

When we were about to move away from Houston, the area presidency started a "fill the temple" program where each ward in each stake was supposed to assign enough patrons to fill every session and perform every ordinance for 3 days (IIRC). The message was pretty clear: without direct assignments, the temple wasn't being used. 

yowzaa! I guess in places like with enough members you could do that but not here, you'd be in the temple every week. I was talking to the Temple President and he was wondering how many people will actually come after the initial push, what's the resting amount? guess we'll see

[rongo]

9 minutes ago, webbles said:

Per https://churchofjesuschristtemples.org/news/closures/

83 has partial vicarious work and I think that is more than a handful.  27 have full vicarious work with appointments.

Less than 1/3 of the temples are not doing vicarious work.

Partial vicarious work = very limited temple baptisms (by appointment). My temple (Gilbert) you can supposedly make an appointment and go do baptisms, but pre-Covid we've waited three hours to be allowed to do three family names (lots of youth). You can imagine what the queue is like even trying to schedule a handful of youth to do a handful of baptisms. My wife is in the YW presidency, and they really want to get their new ones (the 11 year olds) and those who entered the program but have never been able to go due to Covid. Saying that this is an option is different from the reality when the rubber hits the road.  

Most of these are more limited than what is represented. And, with almost all local regulations allowing for full temples at full capacity --- and with Covid numbers, vaccinations, etc. --- the longer the temples stay inoperable for all intents and purposes (for proxy work), the weirder this is. Especially when President Nelson told us our temples would open when local regulations allow it.