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Amid the fires, sacred milestones offer hope to Latter-day Saints in the Inland Northwest
Amid devastating Spokane wildfires, Latter-day Saints found faith and hope through apostolic ministry, service and the groundbreaking of a new Coeur d’Alene temple.
By Jennifer Hicks | For FāVS News
The views expressed in this opinion column are those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect the views of FāVS News.
SPOKANE, Wash. — Twenty-seven years ago, from Aug. 21 to 23, 1999, Latter-day Saints in the Inland Northwest gathered to dedicate the Spokane Washington Temple.
This year, those same August dates arrived under dramatically different circumstances.
Across the Spokane region and Eastern Washington, communities are recovering from devastating wildfires that forced tens of thousands of people from their homes, destroyed or damaged hundreds of structures and left families facing the long work of rebuilding.
Against that backdrop, Aug. 21 to 23 became more than an anniversary. For many local Latter-day Saints, the convergence of events surrounding those dates offered an unexpected message of faith and hope amid profound loss.
On Sunday, Aug. 23, the final day of the 27th anniversary of the Spokane temple’s dedication, President Dieter F. Uchtdorf and Elder Neil L. Andersen of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles came to Spokane to minister to people affected by the fires.
And six days later, on Saturday, Aug. 29, another significant chapter began as ground was broken for the Coeur d’Alene Idaho Temple.
A temple anniversary. An apostolic visit amid disaster. And the beginning of another temple.
The alignment is striking, particularly at a time when so much of the region is grieving.
Faith amid the fire
The Spokane Complex Fires began Aug. 1 and quickly moved from wildland areas into populated communities. More than 65,000 residents were evacuated at the height of the emergency. Families fled with little warning, often not knowing whether their homes would still be standing when they returned.
The physical destruction tells only part of the story. Families lost photographs, keepsakes and places around which their lives were built. Others returned to neighborhoods transformed by fire.
Yet another story has unfolded alongside the devastation: people caring for one another.
Latter-day Saints have joined organizations, first responders and neighbors throughout the region in providing food, water, clothing, emergency supplies and volunteer service. Church humanitarian aid has reached community organizations and Tribal communities across Eastern Washington.
Missionaries serving in the Washington Spokane Mission contributed more than 1,200 hours of service during the first 17 days of August. Church members wrote approximately 400 letters thanking firefighters and first responders. Young people participated in cleanup efforts, while members in the Tri-Cities collected clothing for children and teens in Spokane.
Other acts happened quietly: a meal delivered, a displaced family welcomed into a home, debris cleared from a property or someone simply sitting with a neighbor whose life changed in a matter of hours.
In those moments, faith became something tangible.
An apostolic visit on an anniversary
Then came Sunday, Aug. 23.
President Dieter F. Uchtdorf and his wife, Harriet R. Uchtdorf, and Elder Neil L. Andersen and his wife, Kathy S. Andersen, joined Elder Takashi Wada and his wife, Naomi Wada, Elder Jared M. Spataro, and local Church leaders in Spokane.
They met personally with people whose homes and lives had been affected by the fires, listened to their experiences and offered encouragement as families began contemplating the long road ahead.
Senior Church leaders also joined local Latter-day Saints for a special sacrament meeting following weeks marked by evacuation, loss, uncertainty and service. Their messages centered on faith, hope and the peace found in Jesus Christ.
The timing carried particular significance.
Exactly 27 years earlier, Aug. 23, 1999, had concluded the three-day dedication of the Spokane Washington Temple. For more than a quarter century, that temple has stood as a symbol of Latter-day Saint belief in Jesus Christ, eternal families and promises that extend beyond the difficulties of mortality.
Now, on its anniversary, two apostles came not for a celebration, but to minister amid suffering.
There is something powerful in that contrast.
Faith does not mean tragedy will not come. It does not prevent wildfire, preserve every home or eliminate grief.
Rather, faith asks what we will do when those things come: where we will turn, whom we will serve and whether we can continue to hope when the landscape around us looks very different from the one we knew before.
Another temple begins
On Saturday, Aug. 29, Elder Hutch U. Fale, a General Authority Seventy and member of the Church’s United States West Area Presidency, presided at the groundbreaking for the Coeur d’Alene Idaho Temple.
For Latter-day Saints, temples represent covenant, permanence and hope. They teach that family relationships can endure beyond death and that Jesus Christ’s power to redeem and heal extends beyond present circumstances.
Those beliefs may feel especially poignant in a region where so many have recently watched things they believed were permanent disappear.
Homes can burn. Landscapes can be scarred. Possessions accumulated over a lifetime can be gone in hours.
But faith teaches that not everything can be taken by fire.
Love remains. Covenants remain. Communities remain. The impulse to serve remains. And hope can remain.
Perhaps that is why the groundbreaking of another temple feels particularly meaningful this year. After such a severe trial, the promise of another house of the Lord rising in the Inland Northwest seems somehow sweeter.
What rises after the fire
Recovery will not happen quickly. Families face insurance claims, temporary housing, debris removal and rebuilding. The emotional recovery may last even longer.
But within one remarkable week in August 2026, the Inland Northwest has witnessed three moments that point beyond the disaster.
The region remembered a temple dedicated Aug. 21 to 23, 1999. On Aug. 23, apostles came to sit with and strengthen people experiencing loss. And on Aug. 29, shovels entered the Earth in Coeur d’Alene, beginning construction of another temple.
Between those sacred milestones are the ashes of one of the most painful chapters our region has experienced, along with thousands of acts of compassion.
For people of faith, perhaps that is the greater story of this August.
The fires remind us how quickly the things around us can change. The response reminds us how deeply human beings can care for one another. And these remarkable August dates offer another reminder: Destruction does not have the final word.
We mourn. We minister. We rebuild. And we keep looking toward the light.
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