Roadtrip Updates : Mar 12 - Salt Lake City

So, I had it in my mind for a long time that if I got out this way sometime I wanted to make a stop at Salt Lake City and check out the Temple Square area. Home of the Mormons and undoubtedly the #1 draw in Salt Lake City (sorry, Jazz fans). So on Saturday night, Mar 11, we made the trip northwest through the mountains across Utah. It was probably a beautiful drive but half of it was after dark so I can't say for sure. But judging from the return trip southwest to Bryce Canyon NP on Monday (more on that later), I'm pretty certain it was scenic.

Anyway, we stayed just a few miles outside of SLC and drove in on Sunday morning. First up was mass at the Cathedral of the Madeleine, about 1/3 of a mile down from Temple Square. It's a beautiful old Catholic cathedral, completed in 1909. It is the mother church for Roman Catholics in Utah. The mass we attended was celebrated by their new, recently appointed Bishop - it was a big affair with a large choir, lots of special ministers and all the other assisting celebrants.

Main Altar

Organ

Cathedral of the Madeleine

After Mass, we Headed down to Temple Square, a 10 acre complex in the heart of SLC that houses some of the buildings most important to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS), or as they as commonly referred to: Mormons. I told Dolores to think of the area as the LDS' equivalent of Vatican City. It houses the Salt Lake Temple, the Salt Lake Tabernacle, the Salt Lake Assembly Hall, and two visitor centers. The Temple is an impressive and huge building but is off-limits to non-LDS (and I think most members as well). It has a number of different rooms/areas used for very different and special purposes, as well as the main council room for meetings of the LDS hierarchy. The South Visitor Center has a cut-away model which describes these rooms/areas. This visitor center also has a wing which focuses on the construction of the Temple (the largest of the ~150 Mormon temples) which took 40 years (1853 - 1893). The Tabernacle, which seats 8,000 people, is the home of the famed Mormon Tabernacle Choir. We didn't hear the choir but did attend an organ recital at the Tabernacle. The Assembly Hall is a 2,000 seat congregation hall and hosts the organ/choir recitals & practices at certain times of the year. The North Visitor Center houses the Christus, a large statue of Jesus Christ in a domed room painted with a night-sky scheme - impressive. The lowest level houses a number of exhibits drawn (primarily) from the
Old Testament as well as a number of exhibits depicting events leading to the Book of Mormon (at least that was my interpretation from a short walk-through). Just across the street to the north of Temple Square is the LDS Conference Center, another impressive building. Finished in 2000, it has two balcony levels and seats an astounding 21,000 people - all with no interior pillars blocking anybody's view. The roof top of the building (six acres in area as I recall) actually has a garden with a meadow and trees!

Factoid: The visitors' centers and grounds are staffed by full-time "sister missionaries" and senior missionary couples exclusively; no single male missionaries are called to serve on Temple Square. The sister missionaries serving on Temple Square are from around the world, speaking enough languages to cater to the majority of visitors.