“Ground Broken for Temple in Frankfurt, West Germany,” Ensign, Sept. 1985, 74
Ground Broken for Temple in Frankfurt, West Germany
“This is a day of prophecy fulfilled, of prayers answered, and of dreams come true,” said President Gordon B. Hinckley, Second Counselor in the First Presidency, at the July 1 groundbreaking for the Frankfurt Germany Temple. “It is a historic day.”
He referred to a prophecy of President Joseph F. Smith, who visited Europe in 1910 and said that temples would one day rise on the continent.
President Hinckley was in the midst of helping make the prophecy come true. He had just come from the dedication of the Freiberg Temple in the German Democratic Republic. The day after the groundbreaking for the Frankfurt Temple, President Hinckley dedicated the Stockholm Sweden Temple.
The Frankfurt Germany Temple will actually be located at Friedrichsdorf, a historic city twenty miles north of Frankfurt. The first temple in the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany), it will be built on an elevated piece of property not far from an old French Huguenot church. It is expected to be completed within two years.
The groundbreaking drew hundreds of Latter-day Saints and other residents.
The Church had earlier faced religious and political opposition to building a temple in Friedrichsdorf, but President Hinckley told local officials that they would not regret allowing the temple to be built. It “will be a thing of beauty in this lovely area,” he said. “It will be a source of pride to local residents, who will come to speak of it as ‘our temple.’”
In addition to President Hinckley, other speakers at the groundbreaking included Elder Thomas S. Monson of the Council of the Twelve and Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin of the First Quorum of the Seventy, President of the Church’s Europe Area. Mrs. Reinhuber Andano, vice-chairwoman of the area government, spoke on behalf of local government officials.
Elder Monson said the new temple will be “a place of peace, a place of refuge from the storms of life.”
Elder Wirthlin said it will be “a shield and a protection to the city in the years that lie ahead.”
Mrs. Andano said the temple project has the support and blessings of the local government, and spoke of the groundbreaking as “a great and wonderful day for our city,” as well as for Church members.
She recalled earlier experiences with LDS missionaries and commented: “If the young people who represent your Church as missionaries continue to represent you as they have in the past, we are sure your Church will flourish and will be a blessing to this area.”