South America

“After the revelation, the gospel spread out everywhere across Brazil,” Elder Soares said. “We saw many cities being opened for the teaching of the gospel, and more and more people accepting the gospel.”

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the Church has aided more than 1,000 relief projects in over 150 countries and territories.

The First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has announced that the Salvador Brazil Temple groundbreaking will be held in August 2021. A rendering of the temple has also been released.

As President Russell M. Nelson began the first session of the recent 190th Semiannual General Conference, he noted, “General conference last April was viewed by more people than any preceding it, and we have every expectation that will happen again.”

Moments before the 190th Semiannual General Conference concluded, President Russell M. Nelson announced six new temples that will be built in Tarawa, Kiribati; Port Vila, Vanuatu; Lindon, Utah; Greater Guatemala City, Guatemala; São Paulo East, Brazil; and Santa Cruz, Bolivia.

The First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has announced the groundbreaking date for the Brasília Brazil Temple.

Editor's note: The article below was first published February 12, 2020. On March 18, the Church announced that the open house and dedication of the Rio de Janeiro Brazil Temple are postponed until large public gatherings are deemed safe. See this announcement on the Brazil Newsroom.

Security concerns and travel restrictions prevented President Russell M. Nelson and Elder D. Todd Christofferson from traveling to Venezuela for a devotional on February 2. But this didn't stop them from delivering a message of hope and comfort to the members there.

A state of emergency has been declared in parts of Chile following violent protests and looting.

A free public open house is set to begin on Saturday, October 12 and go through October 19, 2019, for the Asunción Paraguay Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

"Hours before President Russell M. Nelson addressed 12,000 members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints here in Tecnopolis Arena on Wednesday evening, he personally greeted individual children receiving new wheelchairs at a local Latter-day Saint meetinghouse," a recent Church News article states. "To both groups, he offered the same message: The Lord will pour down blessings on those with a willing heart."

President Nelson told the Argentinian Saints of the unusual tranquility he felt as his plane once spiraled toward the earth and some aboard shouted in fear of what was ahead. The source of his peace, he said, was his faith and the death-transcending power of the Christ-focused worship done in the Church’s temples. The Church teaches that these temple rites connect families together forever.

Newsmaking young Colombian President Iván Duque asked for the prayers of President Russell M. Nelson during a meeting between the national leader and the leader of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and thanked him for the church’s influence in the country.

Most children living in Bogotá’s sewers do not want to leave. They grow accustomed to the waist-deep feces, the stench, the darkness, the water and the rats. As frightening and dangerous as the sewers are, the children feel safe there.

A fascinating 2015 article by Scott Hoyt commences with a lengthy quotation from a Catholic chronicler of Peru named Pedro de Cieza de Leon. He was writing around the year 1550, fewer than 20 years after the destruction by Spanish conquistadors of the Inca empire. In the passage that I cite here, Cieza describes the appearance of Viracocha:

A returned missionary going back to visit the country where they served? Normal. Moving there, earning a spot on a professional soccer team, touring nearly the entire country as a back-up dancer, and then starting a movement that involves running down the entire coast of the country picking up tons (literally tons) of trash along the way? Not so normal. But that is exactly what Clayton Thomas Kearl is doing.

"I felt like we were in heaven—I think the Lord gave us an opportunity to feel the spirit of the country and the spirit of the language,” Elder Soares said after this historic dedication of the Fortaleza Brazil Temple.

The First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has announced dates for open houses, a rededication, and a dedication this fall for the Asunción Paraguay and Arequipa Peru Temples.

After becoming nationally recognized as a stalwart "Mama Bear" on behalf of her son Josh Holt, who spent two years in a Venezuelan jail before being released last May, a family social media posting Sunday announced Laurie Moon Holt has died.

Ed Marquez walked toward the main gate of his military school in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It was late spring and he was dressed in white. While Marquez had been on guard duty the night before, a friend also on duty fell asleep. As a result, both young men were forbidden from leaving the school for two weeks. If the guards at the front gates permitted him to leave the campus, Marquez was on his way to be baptized. But if his name was on the list of those not permitted to leave, he could potentially face serious consequences.

The First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced dates for the opening of Brazil’s seventh temple and the 165th temple in the world. The open house for the Fortaleza Brazil Temple is scheduled for April 27 through May 18, 2019. The temple will be dedicated Sunday, June 2, and a devotional for the youth is the day before on June 1.

President Dallin H. Oaks dedicated the Barranquilla Colombia Templeon December 9, 2018, making it the 161st operating temple in the Church. Recently, Daniel Smith from Messages of Christ created a video tour showing the beautiful rooms inside this holy house of the Lord.

The Barranquilla Colombia Temple was formally dedicated Sunday, December 9, 2018, in three sessions by President Dallin H. Oaks, first counselor in the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The dedicatory sessions were broadcast to congregations of the Church within the temple district.

The Brazil Area Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints released a statement after a knife attack during a church service left several injured:

While in Uruguay during his 2018 ministry visit to South America, President Russell M. Nelson had an extensive interview with Sergio Rubin, Pope Francis’s official biographer. “Many churches are ruled by men, at the exclusion of women,” said Mr. Rubin. “Is this the case for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints?”

Latter-day Saint artist Jorge Cocco Santángelo (Jorge Cocco) has always felt the calling to create. “There isn’t one point in time when I became an artist. I just developed as one,” he says.

"If you think the Church has been fully restored, you're just seeing the beginning," President Russell M. Nelson said about the Church in a video during his South American tour.

The public is invited to tour the newly completed Barranquilla Colombia Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Church’s second temple in Colombia, the first having been completed in Bogota in 1999.

As part of the Church’s initiative to simplify and focus on our Savior, the Church moved away from holding a cultural celebration the night before the dedication of the Concepcion Chile Temple and instead held a devotional. During the devotional, President Nelson spoke of the blessings of the temple and how youth can prepare for the eternal blessings that await them.

“[President Nelson] has seen the faith of the people,” Sister Wendy Watson Nelson said. “He has seen the love of the people for the Lord. Now he has seen the love of the people for the temple. That means everything to my husband to see that.”

"The church is a very good member of the community," Concepción Chile's mayor, Alvaro Ortiz, said. "It extends its arms into places the state can't go. The social work of the church is very important here. We recognize their great work. They absolutely and totally make a difference in neighborhoods that need it most."

What examples of faith to sacrifice in order to hear the Lord's prophet on the earth today.

"As President Nelson was describing our membership," Elder Stevenson said, "President Vizcarra was nodding his head, 'Yes, yes, I'm very much aware of them,' and of our young members."

President Russell M. Nelson of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and his wife, Wendy, along with Elder Gary E. Stevenson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and his wife, Lesa, will embark on a ministry tour to South America, culminating with the dedication of the Concepción Chile Temple, in October. The senior leaders of the global faith are scheduled to leave Salt Lake City and meet with Latter-day Saints in five countries in nine days October 19–28, 2018. President Nelson has previously ministered in these countries numerous times.

Two new temple presidents and matrons have been called by the First Presidency. They will begin their service when the temples are dedicated.

The First Presidency has called the following four new temple presidents and matrons. They will begin their service in November 2018.

"When you're going through a bad situation, open your mind and see those small and tender mercies because they really are there," Josh Holt says.

"It was as close to hell as you can imagine," returned missionary Josh Holt said of his imprisonment in Venezuela. But he also acknowledges, "We have to thank everyone that supported us, everyone that prayed for us, that put our names in the temples. Everyone that was there for us and in the end, thank God, he was the one that got us through it."

After a terrifying, two-year imprisonment, Joshua Holt returned home Monday and shared how prayer and faith helped him through his ordeal. Holt's grandmother, Linda Holt, said, “For 678 days, I posted a prayer on Facebook for Josh and Thamy. Our stake has fasted for them. People (have) prayed for them."

On Thanksgiving 2017, Josh Holt posted on Facebook thanking those who have tried to free him, those who have written to him and prayed for him. He also expressed his gratitude for his wife, daughters, family, and shared this touching testimony: "I am also thankful for God. Thankful that he has never left my side and continues to bless me. Even in the darkest of days, we can find the way the Lord is blessing us. Through small and simple things great things come to past. I am thankful for Jesus Christ, for his atonement which without I would never be able to get through this trial . . . There have been so many days here that God has comforted me as I am here alone in this jail cell or lay crying on my bed out of frustration, sadness, or even loneliness."

Returned missionary Josh Holt has been held in a Venezuelan jail for nearly two years while his health steadily deteriorates. The 7-year-old daughter of Holt's wife, who he married shortly before being arrested in June 2016, recently made her way to Utah in February of this year, where she is staying with Holt's family. Both Joshua Holt and his wife, Thamara Candelo, are jailed and fighting for their freedom.

The Church made the following statement on Thursday, March 29:

Joshua Holt, who has been imprisoned in Venezuela for over a year and a half, has sent his wife's 7-year-old daughter to live with his parents in Utah.

Joshua Holt has been imprisoned in Venezuela for over a year and a half. Efforts for his release continue.

Returned missionary Josh Holt has been barred from the hospital despite increasing medical concerns. Recently, a recording of Holt was released where you can hear him saying, "I don't know what to do. I've never felt like this before."