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To: GovernmentShrinker
Thanks .. I heard the question about polygamy asked as well? The Smarts are not truly active or should I say old-fashioned Mormons then I would assume.
82 posted on 06/13/2002 7:28:58 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
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To: NormsRevenge
No, the only reason polygamy has been mentioned is because these are Mormons in Utah and old prejudices die hard. There is nothing whatsoever to suggest any link to any individual or group involved in polygamy. The Smart family are very much active, regular Mormons.
108 posted on 06/13/2002 8:11:35 PM PDT by Grig
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To: NormsRevenge
Your comment belies a pretty thorough ignorance of the term "Mormon". There is one large church, formally called the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Days Saints, whose members are commonly referred to as "Mormons", and which has a membership of over 10 million people. A small percentage of the members of this church practiced polygamy in the 1800s, but they have been strictly prohibited from doing so for over a century. Excommunication is swift and permanent for any member caught involved in polygamy or even advocating it.

There are several tiny splinter groups, each headed by a self-appointed "prophet", but more properly called a "dirty old man", which claim to be following the Book of Mormon as the word of God. Their total numbers are probably only a few hundred, or maybe a few thousand tops. They live out in the boonies, have little money beyond what they scrape up through welfare fraud, and have a habit of forcibly "marrying" their adolescent nieces, each others daughters, etc., and living in polygamous families. Like all wacko splinter groups, they claim to be the "real" Mormons or whatever they're a splinter of. David Koresh's "Branch Davidian" group was a splinter version of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church, and also claimed to be the "real" church, while Koresh kept his followers isolated from the rest of society and helped himself to sex with their little girls.

I don't know about you, but I'm a lot more inclined to take J.W. Marriott's (Mormon and Chairman/CEO of the Marriott Corp.) and Senator Orrin Hatch's word for which church is the "real" Mormon Church. Maybe you prefer to take the dirty old men's word. It's a free country -- you get to choose.

109 posted on 06/13/2002 8:15:23 PM PDT by GovernmentShrinker
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To: NormsRevenge
Polygamy has not been an accepted part of Mormon belief or practice for a very long while.
249 posted on 06/14/2002 11:19:27 PM PDT by luvbach1
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