From Mexico, with Love

As plans were being made for the dedication of the San Diego California Temple, children from Mexico who lived in that temple district wanted to participate and to show their love for the Lord’s house. The big question was how.

A temple dedication committee came up with two ideas—a poster and a rug—that would help the children feel that this was their temple. Primary children were given posters with a beautiful picture of the San Diego Temple. Underneath the picture, the children wrote down their goals in preparing for the dedication. Angela Pedroza, who lives in Ensenada, Mexico, was excited to write down her goals: saying her daily prayers, beginning to read the Book of Mormon, respecting her parents, and taking friends to see the temple. Writing these goals on the poster helped Angela as well as many other children remember the importance of the temple and what they could do to prepare to go to the Lord’s house.

The children also had a special opportunity to make a rug that would be used in the temple’s cornerstone services. They first participated in a drawing contest for the rug’s design. From the winning designs, a lovely rug with six colorful panels was created. Each child was able to take a turn stitching a part of the rug. Their finished handiwork was exhibited at the temple during the cornerstone service.

Many of the children were able to travel to San Diego for the service. Susana Elisabeth Cardenas Vargas was chosen to represent the Mexican Saints as she placed mortar in the cornerstone at the service.

Six-year-old Abrahán Ruelas, from Mexicali, Mexico, was among the children who came to the service. When he saw the angel Moroni on the temple, he recognized it as the part he had helped sew on the rug. “I thought the temple was in heaven and that I was in heaven,” Abrahán says. When the General Authorities accepted the rug, “I was very happy and proud, and I started to cry.” The children were also delighted to see General Authorities standing on the rug during the service.

Abrahán’s sister, Carolina Ruelas, eleven years old, helped sew the portion of the rug representing the ball that the angel Moroni is standing on. She looks forward to returning to the temple to do baptisms for the dead and to be married—and to see the rug displayed there.

The children will never forget their experience of making a rug for the dedication of the San Diego California Temple. That rug is now displayed in the children’s center inside the temple, where many will see their labor of love.

Top: The San Diego California Temple. Above: Susana Elisabeth Cardenas Vargas helps President Hinckley and President Monson put mortar on the cornerstone during the dedication services. Right: Children from Mexico display the rug they created for the temple’s cornerstone service. (Photography by Mabel and Delbert Palmer.)