LDS leader Dallin Oaks dedicates a new temple. Why this one stands out.

Dallin H. Oaks has dedicated Latter-day Saint temples before:

• In 2024, in the Philippine city of Urdaneta.

• In 2023, in Richmond, Virginia.

• In 2018, in Barranquilla, Colombia.

• And, in 2016, in his hometown, at the Provo City Center Temple, rebuilt and rechristened as a temple from the ashes of the fire-ravaged Provo Tabernacle.

Oaks also has rededicated temples in Oakland, California; and Mesa, Arizona.

So what made his dedication Sunday of Idaho’s Burley Temple uniquely special?

It was the first time he had performed that duty as the 18th president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

The 93-year-old Oaks said he opted to dedicate the Burley Temple himself — instead of handing that assignment off to another apostle — because “it [is] close to my heart.” As a child, he lived in nearby Twin Falls for about five years.

The single-spired, two-story, 45,000-square-foot Burley Temple is the church’s 212th operating temple in the world and the seventh in Idaho, where four more are planned.

Oaks said that temple worship will help Latter-day Saints confront and conquer challenging times.

“As we experience Satan’s deadly onslaught on morality and the integrity of families, and as we read the prophecies and feel the signs of the times, we cannot doubt that the future holds great sacrifices and challenges,” he said in a news release. “The times ahead will call for us to remember our temple covenants and to rely on the blessings promised in these Houses of the Lord here in Burley and throughout the world.”

Latter-day Saints view temples as Houses of the Lord and, unlike their more common meetinghouses, are places where devout members participate in the faith’s highest religious rites such as eternal marriage.