Don’t look now, but we’ve been invaded. Thousands are arriving on Sanpete’s “shores” and stampeding into our protected valley. It’s crazy. What are they doing here? Well, for one thing, last weekend, they were buying up all our strawberries, cabbage and corned beef brisket!

You might think I’m joking. But, we had to make stops at Terrel’s Market in Mt. Pleasant, Walmart in Ephraim, and Market Fresh in Manti to get those items for our St. Patrick’s Day dinner last Sunday. (The gal at Terrel’s said that there were a lot of visitors stopping at the store and bought out all the brisket, among other things.)

A great-great grandfather of mine, with his wife and 3-month old son, emigrated in 1842 from County Down, in Ireland to Utah. So, having that much Irish in me, I felt that it was important that we eat traditional Irish fare on St. Paddy’s Day.

“Grandpa” William Adams died in 1901 and is buried in the Bluff, Utah cemetery. Between Ireland and Utah, William was a stonecutter and worked on the Nauvoo LDS Temple.

And, speaking of temples, that brings me to the other reason that Sanpete is being invaded. (It’s not just to buy our corned beef and cabbage.) The invaders are swarming in to take a look at the inside of the Manti Temple.

The two-year renovation and refreshing of the temple have been completed. That means that before the church puts the temple back into service for temple ceremonies and ordinances, the general public is invited to take a tour of the place.

It’s open through April 5th, excluding Sundays. It’s free and all ages are welcome.

My wife and I were volunteer ushers at the temple last Friday night. Any reasonably mature person, regardless of religious affiliation, or nearly any other circumstance, was welcomed during the sign-up for volunteering. Imagine that, I qualified.

We were assigned to be restroom monitors. This was right up my alley. I’ve done a lot of refilling of toilet paper dispensers in my time. In fact, since the pandemic shortages, I still have a really difficult time passing by the “bathroom tissue” in the store without buying a package and putting it into our home storage.

(Hey, it has a really long shelf life. And if a food shortage hits, I’m hoping to find someone who will trade Cocoa Pebbles for toilet paper.)

Our other job at the temple that night was to check on other ushers to see if they needed a break. They were standing there for hours watching people “oooh” and “ahhh” at the beauty and craftmanship of this truly remarkable, pioneer, architectural masterpiece.

I’m glad to report that no usher “went down” on our watch. A few needed to go use the facilities which we were monitoring. (wimps! – just kidding). And a few needed to take a quick break for a drink of water. A couple of teenagers were getting a little shaky and going into some minor withdrawal symptoms being without their cell phones, but they made it. (Whew!)

I would recommend that everyone in Sanpete take the opportunity to tour the temple. I know there are quite a few here who have never been inside.

This is a chance to really get a special look at the place. Even active, temple going members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will see parts of the temple that they’d never see otherwise. There is an on-line reservation system which attempts to space out the visitors, but a reservation is not required to attend.

A guy I know told me, “If they won’t let me in when it’s open; then I don’t want to go in when it’s closed.” Everyone is entitled to their own way of thinking about it. But, I told him to think about it as if he were visiting a museum.

Once the temple is re-dedicated on April 21st, only members of the church who meet certain “worthiness requirements” are the ones allowed into the temple for temple ordinances.

(A side note, I just thought of: The last time I was in Rome, a number of years ago, I forgot about a requirement for entering St. Peter’s Basilica, the huge Catholic church near the Vatican. Men have to wear long pants to enter. I was wearing shorts. So, I didn’t get to go in that time. I understand that shorts which cover the knees are now OK.)

Even seen as a museum, or as a unique building, or as a sort of “castle” even – the temple is worth visiting. The art work is impressive, including full wall murals in several very large rooms. The two spiral staircases, each more than 76 feet tall, are spectacular.

To think that the temple was built out in the wilderness of Central Utah in the 1800s by pioneers with the tools available to them is extraordinary. That seems to be on the minds of most everyone I visited with when we were ushering there.

The crowds were big on Saturday. I don’t know how many thousands went through. When the sun started getting low on that day, something remarkable happened.

It was quite a chilly day and it was getting chillier. Many people waiting in the lines weren’t really dressed for a March evening in Sanpete. And it was taking an hour or two of waiting to get in.

A local married couple who are helping coordinate the temple open house called the woman who is the church Relief Society president for the Manti area. They had an idea and wondered if it was feasible. The idea developed.

Longer story shorter, text messages went out to the Relief Society women of the area. Within a half-hour, hundreds of blankets and dozens of mittens, etc. were brought to temple hill and distributed to the shivering souls in line. To me, that’s quite a success story of technology and “answering the call” for help when help was needed.

Not to pat ourselves on the back or anything, but who knew that my wife and I had 21 blankets at our home to deliver up for lending to coatless visitors. (We weren’t totally self-less though; we kept the “Minky” blanket and some other sentimental quilts, etc. at home.)

This “invasion” going on right now will be a time to remember. It’s almost reminiscent of the days when the Mormon Miracle Pageant was part of every summer in Sanpete. There were many thousands who visited then. We survived and have fond memories. We’ll survive again – regardless of runs on cabbage, corned beef, and strawberries. — Merrill

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