The First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has set a groundbreaking date for the Teresina Brazil Temple.
On Saturday, April 18, ground will be broken for this house of the Lord, presided over by Elder Ciro Schmeil. A General Authority Seventy and first counselor in the Brazil Area presidency, Elder Schmeil was born in Ponta Grossa, Brazil.
Information about the groundbreaking was first published Feb. 23 on ChurchofJesusChrist.org.
The closest temple to Teresina is currently the Fortaleza Brazil Temple, a drive of around 375 miles. Teresina is the capital of the Brazilian state of Piauí.
On April 2, 2023, then-Church President Russell M. Nelson announced the Teresina temple. It was one of 15 temple locations he identified in April 2023 general conference, including another Brazil house of the Lord, in Natal.
Planned for northeastern Brazil, the Teresina temple will be approximately 25,420 square feet. It will stand on a 3.60-acre site at Avenida Cajuína and Rua Pedro Conde, Noivos, Teresina, Piauí.
About the Church in Brazil
Latter-day Saint missionaries began preaching in southern Brazil in 1928. By the time the São Paulo Brazil Temple — the first in South America — was dedicated in 1978, membership in the country had reached 54,000.
Home now to more than 1.5 million Latter-day Saints in around 2,100 wards and branches, Brazil has 24 temples in various stages of operation, construction and planning.
The country’s 11 operating temples include the São Paulo (dedicated in 1978), Recife (2000), Porto Alegre (2000), Campinas (2002), Curitiba (2008), Manaus (2012), Fortaleza (2019), Rio de Janeiro (2022), Belém (2022), Brasília (2023) and Salvador (2024) temples.
Another five houses of the Lord are under construction in Brazil, including the Belo Horizonte (since 2023), Ribeirão Preto (2024), Londrina (2024), Natal (2025) and João Pessoa (2026) temples.
That leaves eight temples in planning and design stages, for São Paulo East (announced 2020), Vitória (2021), Maceió (2022), Santos (2022), Teresina (2023), Goiânia (2023), Florianópolis (2024) and Campo Grande (2025).
