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The First Presidency circulated a letter dated January 24, 2017 that reads as follows:

To: General Authorities; General Auxiliary Presidencies; Area Seventies, Stake, Mission, and District Presidencies; Bishops and Branch Presidents; Stake and Ward Auxiliary Presidencies, and Managing Directors

Dear Brothers and Sisters:

During the next few years, the Church will enter a period of significant anniversaries of major Church history events. The Church will not be commemorating these anniversaries at the general level. However, stake and ward leaders may choose to commemorate some of them at the local level.

We ask that any local commemorations not place undue burdens on leaders and members.

Sincerely yours,

/s/The First Presidency

I appreciate the concern that local leaders not unduly burden the members with putting on such celebrations.

I was puzzled, however, about just what it is we might be locally celebrating. The letter just assumes it’s obvious and so doesn’t go into detail, but it’s not obvious to me.

The first thing I thought of was the First Vision. But assuming the canonical dating in the spring of 1820, that’s still over three years away. (Talk about advanced planning!) And it might be hard to celebrate that in a formal way, since we don’t have an actual date for it, and focusing on the anniversary of it might raise the uncomfortable (to some) issues about whether the experience should be dated several years later.

One of my blogmates helpfully pointed out that this October 27 will be 75 years after Helmuth Huebener was executed by the Nazis. Could that be one of the unspoken referents?

So I’m going to open it up to you. What are some of the upcoming significant anniversaries of major Church history events local church leaders should be thinking about celebrating? (Feel free to provide either serious answers or humorous ones, or both).