![\"Mexico's](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2016\/12\/mexico-city-mexico-temple-night-947855-gallery.jpg\")
<\/a>Almost a week ago, posting from Mexico City<\/a>, I wrote that<\/p>\n One of the high points for the day was visiting the Veracruz M\u00e9xico Temple.\u00a0 In outward appearance, it\u2019s very similar if not identical to several of the other small temples that were built in M\u00e9xico and elsewhere during the rapid flurry of temple construction that was undertaken during Gordon B. Hinckley\u2019s tenure as president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints<\/a>.\u00a0 However, I very much liked its unusually visible location in an attractive, upscale area of the city, and its grounds were beautiful and exceptionally well maintained.\u00a0 It\u2019s a nice advertisement, as it were, for the Restoration and the Church.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n I came under attack for that comment on the Peterson Obsession Board. \u00a0I was, you see, \u201cbragging\u201d about the temple\u2019s upscale location. \u00a0Jesus, if he wanted to build temples in the first place, wouldn\u2019t put them in exclusive, expensive areas where impoverished people don\u2019t dare to come. \u00a0So I was, the criticism has it, being unchristlike in boasting of the temple\u2019s posh neighborhood. \u00a0Unlike me and my church, Jesus cares about the poor and the needy, the downtrodden and the oppressed. \u00a0And, anyway, temples are a waste of money. \u00a0They serve no useful purpose.<\/p>\n I\u2019ll leave that last objection alone. \u00a0All it really means is that those complaining about Latter-day Saint temples don\u2019t share the faith of believing Latter-day Saints and don\u2019t view temples as Latter-day Saints view them. \u00a0But that\u2019s both obvious and trivial. \u00a0It\u2019s of no more interest than the fact that non-Catholics don\u2019t believe in transubstantiation or that non-Muslims don\u2019t believe the Qur\u2019an to be the infallible and literal Word of God or that Flat Earthers don\u2019t believe Earth to be a sphere or that atheists deny the existence of the divine \u2014 and it would be silly for unbelievers to expect believers to behave in conformity with the unbelievers\u2019 rejection of the Mass or of the Qur\u2019an or of a spherical Earth or of God.<\/p>\n Not to be churlish, however, I do still want to correct the record. \u00a0First of all, I agree that the Saints and the Church need to care for the impoverished and the disadvantaged. \u00a0And, in remarkable ways, they do. \u00a0(I actually post on this topic several times in any typical week. \u00a0My position on the matter is scarcely secret.) \u00a0Secondly, I wasn\u2019t \u201cbragging\u201d about the temple\u2019s location. \u00a0I was simply saying that it was very nice and very visible. \u00a0My main focus was on the immaculate, manicured, and beautiful grounds of the temple, which I admired.<\/p>\n We saw several temples while I was down in Central America, and the temple in Veracruz was the only one of these that I would characterize as being in an upscale neighborhood. \u00a0A gas station stands across the street from the very small Guatemala City Guatemala Temple. \u00a0The Miraflores Guatemala City Guatemala Temple, which is still under construction, is three times the size of the Guatemala City Guatemala Temple but stands on a postage-stamp-sized plot of land in a quite busy and crowded area that no reasonable person would never call \u201cupscale.\u201d \u00a0The Villahermosa Mexico Temple is surrounded by a jumble of what look like small businesses. \u00a0Finally, the Mexico City Mexico Temple, which is part of a large complex of chapels and Church offices and a visitors center, faces a number of not-very-elegant business establishments, and I\u2019m told that the area directly behind it is quite poor and even somewhat dangerous.<\/p>\n But, in any case, the Lord doesn\u2019t seem to oppose making his temples nice. \u00a0Exodus 25\u201331 and 35\u201340, which describe the Israelites\u2019 portable tent shrine, the Tabernacle, were (according to mainstream Jewish and Christian belief) given by divine revelation, and they depict the use of the very best craftsmanship and the finest materials available. \u00a0The Tabernacle was the forerunner of Solomon\u2019s temple (on which, see 1 Kings and 2 Chronicles), which itself employed imported woods and gold and precious stones and the best manner of construction that the kingdom could muster \u2014 and the biblical accounts say that God explicitly accepted the building.<\/p>\n Now, of course, the predominantly atheistic folks on the Obsession Board are free to disdain and reject what the Bible says about the tabernacle and about the temple of Solomon, but they can\u2019t reasonably expect people who accept<\/em> the biblical accounts to act as if they<\/em> don\u2019t. \u00a0They are free to create their own god or non-god to their own liking, but nobody else is obliged to follow them in that.<\/p>\n One final matter: An Obsession Board critic faults me for supposedly bragging about locating temples in expensive areas where impoverished Saints dare not venture. \u00a0But this is absurd. \u00a0We tend, it\u2019s true, not to put temples in dangerously run-down areas suffering from high crime rates and urban decay and no garbage pick-up and no public transportation. \u00a0But there is no bar against poor Latter-day Saints entering our temples, where everyone dresses alike and class distinctions are invisible and the covenants and promises are the same for all. \u00a0Isn\u2019t it wonderful that even the poorest are welcomed into the House of the Lord if they keep their covenants and obey the commandments? \u00a0Isn\u2019t it wonderful that they are welcome in such serene and beautiful places?<\/p>\n While I\u2019m on the subject of temples, by the way, I note with great satisfaction that construction has now commenced on the long-delayed Cody Wyoming Temple. \u00a0Readers may recall that there was vociferous and highly-organized opposition to that temple. \u00a0The building would, the critics said, loom over the city of Cody, blocking views of the mountains and obscuring the night sky, ruining their rustic rural paradise.<\/p>\n Candidly, such objections always seemed disingenuous to me. \u00a0The temple will be less than 10,000 square feet in size, and it will be set apart on its own nearly five-acre site. Look at the first dozen or so construction photographs, including some from the groundbreaking ceremony.<\/a>\u00a0 Look at the landscape around it. \u00a0Does it really appear as if the temple will loom over Cody, dominating the town and wiping out views of the sky and the mountains?<\/p>\n As political as I\u2019m likely to become here: \u00a0Am I happy with the outcome of the U.S. presidential election? \u00a0No, I am not. \u00a0But then, I also wouldn\u2019t have been happy with the results had they gone the other way. \u00a0Furthermore, the election isn\u2019t really over yet: \u00a0If Vice President Kamala Harris has the, umm, courage to do what should be done to protect our country and our constitution, she\u2019ll refuse to certify the election. \u00a0Right? \u00a0At least (mercifully!) I\u2019m hearing no complaints about the 2024 election having been stolen \u2014 although the inimitable Kari Lake remains to be heard from. \u00a0Based on current figures, it appears that Ms. Lake may be fraudulently denied her seat in the Senate of the United States just as she was fraudulently denied the governorship of Arizona in 2022 and just as she will be fraudulently denied the papacy following the pontificate of Pope Francis.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0 Almost a week ago, posting from Mexico City, I wrote that One of the high points for the day was visiting the Veracruz M\u00e9xico Temple.\u00a0 In outward appearance, it\u2019s very similar if not identical to several of the other small temples that were built in M\u00e9xico and elsewhere during the rapid flurry of temple […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":105540,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[36132,2905,788,641,15745,23782],"class_list":["post-107695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-cody","tag-latter-day-saint","tag-mormon","tag-temple","tag-veracruz","tag-wyoming"],"yoast_head":"\n<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>