Dates for the open house and dedication of the Lisbon Portugal Temple have been announced.
The temple — Portugal’s first — will be dedicated Sunday, Sept. 15, with the free public open house scheduled from Saturday, Aug. 17, through Saturday, Aug. 31, excluding Sundays. A youth devotional with senior Church leaders is scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 14, a day before the dedication.
The temple is located in the northeastern section of the city near the modern parish of Parque das Nacoes.
The dates were announced Monday, March 4, by the Church in a post on its Newsroom site.
The temple was announced by President Thomas S. Monson in the opening session of the October 2010 general conference. Elder Patrick Kearon, a General Authority Seventy who then was Europe Area president, presided over the Dec. 5, 2014, groundbreaking and site dedication.
Portugal is home to nearly 45,000 members in 68 congregations as well as six stakes, four districts and one mission. The closest temple to the country currently is the Madrid Spain Temple, with more than 300 miles, or 500 kilometers, separating Lisbon and Madrid.
There are 201 temples worldwide operating, announced or under construction, 12 of which are in Europe.
The first Latter-day Saint meetings in Portugal were in the early 1970s among members serving there in the United States military. In 1974, President Spencer W. Kimball visited the country and was told the Church would be officially recognized with mission work allowed.
Also in 1974, William Grant Bangerter was called as the first mission president in Portugal, with four missionaries serving in Brazil reassigned to Lisbon. Four years later, Church membership had reached 1,000.
