Some 20 miles from where The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints built its first temple nearly 190 years ago, ground has been broken for a new house of the Lord once again in upstate Ohio.
Elder Vaiangina Sikahema, a General Authority Seventy and first counselor in the Church’s North America Northeast Area presidency, presided at the groundbreaking for the Cleveland Ohio Temple on Saturday, June 1. He offered a message as well as a prayer dedicating the temple’s site and construction process.
It was one of two temple groundbreakings conducted that day, as Elder Ricardo P. Giménez, a General Authority Seventy and second counselor in the North America Central Area presidency, presided at the groundbreaking of the Teton River Idaho Temple in Rexburg, Idaho.
“So many of you are pioneers in this area and have made this day possible, and we thank you,” Elder Sikahema said to gathered community leaders and Church members at the Cleveland event.
In his prayer, Elder Sikahema expressed gratitude for the early Latter-day Saints who gathered with the Prophet Joseph Smith in Kirtland, Ohio, when the Church was “in its fledgling infancy” and “not yet a year old.”
“Holy Father, we stand here now nearly two centuries from those difficult days, blessed because Thy people followed the Prophet Joseph to this great land of Ohio,” he said.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints built its first temple in Kirtland, Ohio, with the first house of the Lord in this dispensation being dedicated in 1836. Earlier this year, the Church reassumed stewardship of the Kirtland Temple, which will remain as a historic building and not be used as an operating house of the Lord.
Cleveland is on the southern shore of Lake Erie in the United States’ Great Lakes region, with the temple site about 20 miles from Kirtland.
Referring in his prayer to Ohio as “a special place in the history of Thy restored gospel,” Elder Sikahema asked that Latter-day Saints residing in the Cleveland Ohio Temple district be blessed and “endowed with power from on high.”
“We ask Thee to bless the rising generation of this great area,” he prayed, acknowledging the youth. “May they be equal to what is expected of them at Thy hands.”
The groundbreaking service was reported by ChurchofJesusChrist.org.
President Russell M. Nelson announced a house of the Lord for Cleveland, Ohio, in April 2022 general conference, one of 17 new locations he identified on April 3, 2022. The site for the Cleveland temple was released on Dec. 19, 2022, with an exterior rendering first published on July 25, 2023.
Projected to be a single-story building of approximately 9,900 square feet, the Cleveland Ohio Temple is being built at Brecksville Road, south of Longano Drive, in Independence, Cuyahoga County, Ohio.
Speakers during the Cleveland Ohio Temple groundbreaking ceremony spoke about the importance of performing ordinances, making covenants, receiving instruction and participating in the temple.
“Temples are sacred houses of the Lord where magnificent work is done,” said Natalie Pavkov, a youth speaker from the Kirtland Ohio Stake. “Temples are especially important for sealing families together and many other covenants and ordinances.”
Christine Headrick, of the Akron Ohio Stake, spoke about covenants in one’s everyday life and the joy they bring. She recalled teaching others of the temple — as a full-time missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ and afterward.
“I got to teach many wonderful friends about binding promises with God,” she said. “I could see the Light of Christ grow brighter and brighter in their lives every day. Having a temple here in Cleveland will allow more people to make covenants with God.”
Thomas Rice, of the Cleveland Ohio Stake, spoke about the promises one makes to God in the temple that are covenants with Him. “Our covenants will protect, inspire and lead us back to our heavenly home,” he said.
Also during the program, a children’s choir sang the Primary hymn “I Love To See the Temple.”
Ohio is home to more than 64,500 Church members in more than 125 congregations. The temple in Cleveland will be the state’s second operating temple, with the groundbreaking date coming nearly a full year after the rededication of the first.
The Columbus Ohio Temple was rededicated on June 4, 2023, by the late President M. Russell Ballard, then acting president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.
A third house of the Lord for Ohio was announced for Cincinnati less than two months ago — on April 7 — at the conclusion of the April 2024 general conference.
