“A Mountain of a Challenge”

In 1977 Church President Spencer W. Kimball announced plans to build a temple in Pago Pago, American Samoa, to serve Saints in the South Pacific. Local leaders in the Samoan Islands, Tahiti, Tonga, and Fiji accepted the challenge of raising a portion of the funds and labor for construction. “We’ve been given a mountain of a challenge, but we’ll just have to climb,” responded Victor Cave of Tahiti. “The people can do it; they have great faith.”

Saints rose to the challenge, but the groundbreaking was delayed because of difficulties securing the title to the temple site. In the meantime, Church leaders had decided to build smaller temples closer to more Saints. In April 1980 President Kimball announced temples would be built in Tonga and Tahiti—and in Apia, Samoa—rather than in Pago Pago. Saints in American Samoa had to exercise faith and adjust to this change of temple location. Members still contributed generously to the Apia temple’s construction. Eugene Reid, president of the Pago Pago Samoa Stake at the time, was among them. “I told my family … we need to do something for the Lord,” he said.

Although they were honored to serve the Lord in any place, American Samoa’s Saints also hoped Pago Pago might have a temple someday. Almost 30 years later, Church President Russell M. Nelson announced it would. “I cried in humility and gratitude for this wonderful blessing,” Andrew Autele, a stake patriarch in Pago Pago, said. “I felt our Heavenly Father’s overwhelming love for our island Saints.”