The Mormon Church has announced plans to build a temple in Wichita, which will be its first one in the state of Kansas. Steven R. Banger, First Counselor in the North America Central Area Presidency, will preside at the groundbreaking on September 7, the “Deseret News” in Salt Lake City reported.
The temple will be located in Wichita on a 6.42-acre site on North Meridian Avenue in the Moorings Plaza development. It will be a single-story temple. According to the church, there are around 40,000 Latter-day Saints in Kansas across about 75 congregations. The first branch in the state was organized in 1882. Right now, the Kansas City temple is the closest one for many members in Kansas.
Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints consider temples special places of worship, allowing faithful members to participate in ordinances that unite family members together forever.
READ: For Mormons, Garden of Eden is near Kansas City
President Russell M. Nelson of the Mormon Church first announced the Wichita Temple in an April 2022 general conference talk.
A year later, Nelson also announced plans to build a temple in Springfield, Mo. It will be the third Mormon temple in Missouri. The St. Louis Temple was dedicated in June 1997, and the Kansas City Missouri Temple was dedicated in May 2012. Missouri is home to more than 75,000 Latter-day Saints in 160 congregations. In the 1830s, Independence and its surrounding counties were an important gathering place for Latter-day Saints in the early days of the Mormon Church.
–Alan Goforth | Metro Voice
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