For the past five years, the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico has endured a series of challenges and catastrophic events — from 2017’s Hurricane Maria, one of the worst cyclones to ever strike the Caribbean, to this fall’s Hurricane Fiona, and from a pair of magnitude-6.0 earthquakes in 2019 and 2020 to the COVID-19 pandemic, the latter having claimed more than 5,000 lives.
About a year after the devastating Hurricane Maria resulted in prolonged periods of water and power outages and extensive damage across the United States island territory, President Russell M. Nelson of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints provided hope and joy to the more than 20,000 Church members residing in Puerto Rico as he announced a new temple for the capital city of San Juan.
Emotions of spiritual elation and comfort are elevated even more today with the start of the open house period of San Juan Puerto Rico Temple. In conjunction with the temple’s media day and start of special-guest tours starting Monday, Nov. 28, the Church released a video and a series of photographs of the temple’s interior and exterior on ChurchofJesusChrist.org.
“Imagine everything that we have gone through with the difficult situations of Hurricane Maria, the earthquakes and the emotional troubles we had,” said Nidza Henriquez, a Latter-day Saint for nearly a half-century. “Getting the news of the temple, that we no longer have to travel far away (to attend the temple), is a wonderful blessing.”
The Prophet’s visit and promise
Following the devastation across the island caused by Hurricane Maria on Sept. 20, 2017, the Church provided extensive relief to Puerto Rico. In addition to monetary assistance, the Church donated mobile medical outreach services, food and water supplies, hygiene and cleaning kits, batteries, bedding, mosquito nets and roofing materials to those in need.
On Sept. 2, 2018, President Nelson stopped in San Juan during one of his world ministries in his first year as President of the Church.
“As you individually grow to become more of the person God wants you to be, you can know for yourself that better days are ahead for the people of Puerto Rico,” he said, speaking to the Puerto Rican Saints in their native Spanish language. “You can face your tomorrows with great optimism, knowing that the best days of your life are ahead for you and for your loved ones.”
A month later, during October 2018 general conference, President Nelson announced a temple for San Juan, with the first rendering of the planned temple released just a few weeks later.
Elder Walter F. González, a General Authority Seventy who was president of the Caribbean Area at the time, presided over the May 4, 2019, groundbreaking.
Dedication and design details
The San Juan Puerto Rico Temple is the first in the territory and the third in the Caribbean, with dedicated and operating temples located in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, and Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles will dedicate the San Juan Puerto Rico Temple on Jan. 15, 2023, in three sessions — at 9 a.m., 12 noon and 3 p.m. local time.
The dedicatory sessions will be broadcast to all congregations in the San Juan Puerto Rico Temple district. Members living in Puerto Rico currently reside in the Santo Domingo Dominican Republic Temple district, requiring a flight of some 250 miles across the Caribbean Sea between San Juan and Santo Domingo.
The temple — a single-story, 6,988-square-foot edifice sitting on a 2.97-acre site — features a domed spire rising over the temple entrance, with the exterior featuring the Spanish colonial architecture common throughout historic Old San Juan, including the “El Morro,” the district’s iconic Castillo San Felipe del Morro.
The interior glass patterns were inspired by the quatrefoil motifs also found in Spanish colonial architecture. Similar patterns are repeated in ordinance-room fabrics, using the colors blue, gold, opal white and green.
This month’s open house
Like Henriquez, many of the more than 23,400 Latter-day Saints in Puerto Rico, see the new San Juan temple as a sign of God’s love at a time needed by local members, providing peace, comfortable and perspective while participating in the ordinances and covenants that are part of temple worship.
After several days of special-guest tours, the temple will begin its public open house on Thursday, Dec. 1, running through Saturday, Dec. 17, excluding Sundays.
“We are telling everyone about the open house and inviting them,” said Henriquez. “This is a way for us to share with others why the temple is so important to us — you never know what hearts can be touched.”
Her own heart was touched nearly 50 years ago when as an 18-year-old in her hometown of Ponce in southern Puerto Rico, Henriquez listened to Church missionaries and accepted the invitation to be baptized.
The small congregation in Ponce first met at an Episcopal church, with the local parish giving them permission to gather until they raised the necessary funds to build their own meetinghouse.
And now, she has seen the growth from a hometown meetinghouse to a home-island temple. “I have been waiting for this temple, and it is a blessing,” Henriquez said. “I feel so happy to be able to see that in Puerto Rico there is a temple.”
The Church’s presence on Puerto Rico dates to 1947, when Latter-day Saint military personnel began holding meeting in Guajataca, in the island’s northwest area. In January 1964, the first missionaries arrived in Puerto Rico, with the first convert baptism coming the following month. In 1980, the first meetinghouse opened and home seminary began.
Humanitarian efforts
Since Hurricane Maria devastated much of the island in late 2017, the Church’s humanitarian efforts on the island have increased with substantial emergency relief.
In addition to monetary assistance, the Church has participated in 34 humanitarian projects in Puerto Rico since 2018, including earthquake and cyclone relief efforts and supplies; emergency aid to hospitals and schools; drought, disease and livelihood assistance; and psychosocial support.
In response to the more recent Hurricane Fiona this fall, the Church has funded projects with the American Red Cross, United Nations World Food Program, Rotary Club, Project hope, Gogo Foundation and other charitable organizations to provide medical supplies, shelter, clean water, food, sanitation and hygiene support and financial assistance to aid those affected by Fiona.
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