On Sunday, April 5, 2020, President Russell M. Nelson announced that the Church will construct a temple in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE). “The plan for a temple in Dubai comes in response to their gracious invitation, which we gratefully acknowledge,” said President Russell M. Nelson in his historic announcement.
The Dubai temple will be the first to be built by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Middle East. It will serve thousands of Latter-day Saints living in two stakes in the Gulf States and a number of member districts in the Middle East, northern Africa, eastern Europe, and western Asia.
“We are grateful to the leaders and people of the United Arab Emirates,” said Elder Anthony D. Perkins, president of the Church’s Middle East Africa North Area. “They have been kind, gracious and welcoming to us and to people of all faith traditions. The United Arab Emirates is a crossroads of commerce, education and innovation. The UAE resident population consists of more than 200 nationalities, where people of many different faiths worship, work and live together peacefully.”
The United Arab Emirates has been an example of tolerance and religious inclusion since the country was founded in 1971. The first self-standing Church meetinghouse in the Middle East was dedicated by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland in the emirate of Abu Dhabi in 2013.
The new temple will be built in District 2020, the future legacy site of Expo 2020 Dubai, after that worldwide event concludes. The site will include both a meetinghouse and a temple. The meetinghouse is where Church members living in Dubai will meet for weekly worship services.
Church members from the region and the world will come to the temple in Dubai to worship. Temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are sacred places where holy religious rites are performed, including marriage to unite families for eternity.
“We are grateful to the government officials of the United Arab Emirates who have welcomed us so warmly into their country,” said Elder David A. Bednar, who oversees the work of the Church in the region. “Only the Spirit of the Lord could have brought about such a mighty miracle. The presence of a temple in Dubai will be a great blessing in the lives of our Church members.”