Major Mormon temple opens doors to celebrate rededication
WASHINGTON — In a rare opportunity, the doors of one of the largest and highest-profile temples of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will be open to visitors.
By church custom, temples are open to nonmembers only at dedications. The last time this happened for the Washington D.C. Temple, which covers more than 150,000 square feet, was at its opening, in 1974: Nearly 750,000 people visited the temple.
After recent renovations, the Washington D.C. Temple will be rededicated — and is welcoming visitors from now until June 11. Church leaders expect the turnout to be the same as 1974’s, if not higher.
Once the temple is rededicated, on Aug. 14, only church members will be allowed inside.
“We want you to know that what happens in the temple is not secret — but sacred,” said Reyna Aburto, second counselor for the Relief Society General Presidency, the church’s women’s organization, who took reporters around the building April 18.
The Washington D.C. Temple, with its distinctive white-and-gold spires visible from miles around, is in Kensington, Md., a few miles from the capital’s northwest border. Opened in 1974, it was the first temple built on the East Coast and remains one of the most well-known temples in the world.
At the time of its opening, the temple’s district — a term the faith uses to organize congregations — included about 20,000 church members living in the Washington region, as well 280,000 other members across the Eastern United States, Canada, the Caribbean and South America whom the temple served. Its opening, and its growing congregation, reflected the 20th-century expansion of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which is headquartered in Utah.
Today, the temple serves about 150,000 Mormons in the Washington region. There are more than 170 temples around the world serving 16.8 million church members.
In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, temples aren’t usually used for regular Sunday worship services. In fact, they are closed on Sundays, when members go to meeting houses, which are open to any guest who wants to attend a Sunday service. Instead, Mormon temples host the faith’s most sacred ceremonies, including baptisms for the dead and marriages.
Before entering the temple, guests don shoe covers to help preserve the space. The interior is decorated with gold trim, shining chandeliers and marble structures.
The tour begins by walking across a bridge from the entry room into the temple — a symbol, church leaders said, of leaving the world behind to enter the holy place. The structure is built with such symbolism in mind, intended to reflect the path of growing closer to God and uniting the familial unit.
“It symbolizes a journey,” said David Bednar, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, the church’s highest-ranking elders. “Ultimately, we will end up in a room called the Celestial Room. That’s representative of our heavenly home, returning back to the presence of our Heavenly Father.”
The temple closed in March 2018 to begin the renovations — including the installment of new plumbing and energy-efficient mechanical, electrical and lighting systems.
Dan Holt, project manager for the renovation project, said in a news release that the restoration was intended to “bring the building back to its original glory” as a midcentury-modern structure.
A Gothic arch motif, designed to direct eyes upward, is prevalent in the altars, carpeting, gold leafing and the stained-glass windows. The colors in the glass are lighter the higher up they are, to signify “brighter light we have and the knowledge we receive from the gospel as we learn and grow and ascend to be more like our Heavenly Father,” Holt said.