The Church in Thailand

Latter-day Saint missionaries first preached in Thailand in 1968. Local members helped establish the Church through their outreach and example of service and love, particularly in organizing cleanup after natural disasters and sharing the gospel with their friends and neighbors. Thailand’s first stake was organized 1995, and the Bangkok Thailand Temple was dedicated in 2023.

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History of the Church in Thailand

Following American missionary Elam Luddington’s short mission in 1854, no further attempts were made to establish the Church in Thailand for more than a century. In 1968, Anan Eldredge, a Thai member who had joined the Church after meeting a Latter-day Saint family in Bangkok, tutored missionaries in the Thai language and culture when they first arrived. In 1969, Natthamon D. Limsukon, a member from Chiang Mai, was similarly instrumental in helping missionaries establish local congregations in northern Thailand.

Local members’ outreach and example were critical to the survival of the Church in delicate cultural and political circumstances. Members hosted cultural events at local meetinghouses, excelled in the arts, organized to clean up after natural disasters, and reached out in love to share the gospel with friends and neighbors.

In 1988, Margaret and Anan Eldredge were called to preside over the Thailand Bangkok Mission. In June 1995, when the Bangkok Thailand Stake was organized, local members accepted callings as stake president, stake Relief Society president, and stake patriarch. Shortly after the announcement of the planned Bangkok Thailand Temple, Saints celebrated the first half century of the Church’s establishment. Truly “by [their] faith with great diligence, and with patience,” the gospel fruit had taken root and become “a tree springing up unto everlasting life” (Alma 32:41).

Read more in Global Histories.