TEMPLE SQUARE ORGANIZED INTO A MISSION

It became apparent that Temple Square was one of the most effective ways to introduce The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints to many people from around the world. In 1981 the first five couples were assigned as full time missionaries to Temple Square. For the next few years, missionaries from the Salt Lake City Mission were handling all of the foreign language tours. In 1987 it was the first time when 16 young sister missionaries were assigned as visitors' center missionaries.

By 1989 all volunteers then reaching 1,200 were released and Temple Square was fully staffed with full-time young sister missionaries.On March 23rd, 1995, Temple Square became officially a mission of it's own called Utah Salt Lake City Temple Square Misison. It is the smallest mission in the Church geographically. R. Witt was the president of the mission at the time with about 175 sister missionaries and about 35 couples(senior missionry couples). The sister missionaries were from around the world with a language capability with over 30 languages spoken. The major goal of the mission was to "find" people that want to learn more,rather than "teach" people the Gospel of Jesus Christ. In other words the mission would gather referrals and those who visited Temple Square and had a desire to learn more would be taught by local missionaries wherever they lived.

Since 1988 visitor attendance on Temple Square has fluctuated between 4 and 5 million people a year. Referrals to missions around the world have progressively grown in number each year. More and more visitors coming are feeling the spirit of God there and have a desire to learn more about the church.