Two temple groundbreakings have been announced for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — one for Victoria, British Columbia, and the other for Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Ground will be broken for the Victoria British Columbia Temple and Tulsa Oklahoma Temple on the same day — Saturday, Aug. 22.
Presiding over the groundbreaking of the Victoria temple will be Elder James E. Evanson, a General Authority Seventy and member of the Canada Area presidency.
Elder Pedro X. Larreal, also a General Authority Seventy, will preside over the groundbreaking in Tulsa.
These groundbreaking dates, announced by the First Presidency, were published in a June 22 news release on ChurchofJesusChrist.org.
In addition, an architectural rendering and site map were released today for the Victoria temple.
Read more below about these two houses of the Lord and the history of the Church in their respective locations.
About the Victoria temple and the Church in Canada
Planned as a single-story building of approximately 11,400 square feet, the Victoria temple will be built on a 4.7-acre site located along Mantle Heights Road, Langford, British Columbia. An accompanying patron waiting area will also be built.
On April 7, 2024, then-Church President Russell M. Nelson announced a house of the Lord for Victoria, British Columbia. It was one of 15 temple locations he identified in the April 2024 general conference.
The Victoria temple is planned to be the second in British Columbia, and it’s one of 11 temples in various stages throughout Canada.
Nine of those are dedicated: the Cardston Alberta (dedicated in 1923), Toronto Ontario (1990), Halifax Nova Scotia (1999), Regina Saskatchewan (1999), Edmonton Alberta (1999), Montreal Quebec (2000), Vancouver British Columbia (2010), Calgary Alberta (2012) and Winnipeg Manitoba (2021) temples.
The Lethbridge Alberta Temple is in its construction phase, after its groundbreaking in April 2025.
That leaves the Victoria temple as the 11th house of the Lord in Canada, currently the only one in planning stages.
The gospel was first preached in Canada when Joseph Smith Sr., the father of the Prophet Joseph Smith, crossed the U.S. border and went to several towns in eastern Canada. Over the next two decades, some 2,500 Canadians were converted. Cardston was settled by Latter-day Saints in 1887.
More than 211,000 Latter-day Saints live in Canada, meeting in around 500 wards and branches.
About the Tulsa temple and the Church in Oklahoma
The Tulsa temple will be a single-story building of approximately 29,600 square feet. It will stand on a 25.7-acre site at the northwest corner of 51st Street and 136th East Avenue in Tulsa, Tulsa County, Oklahoma.
President Nelson announced this house of the Lord on Oct. 1, 2023, during the October 2023 general conference. It was one of 20 temples he announced at the conference, the second for Oklahoma.
The state’s first temple — the Oklahoma City Oklahoma Temple — was dedicated July 30, 2000, by President James E. Faust, second counselor in the First Presidency. After extensive renovations, it was rededicated May 19, 2019, by President Henry B. Eyring, then second counselor in the First Presidency.
The first Latter-day Saint congregation in Oklahoma was created 1921 in Gore, Oklahoma, about 60 miles southeast of Tulsa. The state’s first meetinghouse for the Church was built in Manard, Cherokee County, in 1892.
Oklahoma’s first stakes were established in 1960 — one in Tulsa on May 1, the other in Oklahoma City on Oct. 23. The Oklahoma Mission was created on June 10, 1970.
Tulsa is the second-most-populous city in Oklahoma, a state home to nearly 54,000 Church members in around 100 congregations.
