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With Mitt Romney campaigning...his Mormon religion is coming under increasing scrutiny. SNIP Now Mark Driscoll, pastor of the high-profile Seattle-based Mars Hill Church, has added his voice to the fray -- agreeing that Christians should consider Mormons as members of a "cult" and not "brothers and sisters in a common faith." Writing on his website Tuesday, Driscoll goes on at length about the various definitions of a cult. He is careful to say that Mormonism has "outgrown" the popular culture and sociological definitions of a cult because of its enormous growth and general acceptance in the nation. But, Driscoll writes,...

I had been a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter -day Saints for just a few days when I encountered my first experience of anti-Mormon prejudice. -SNIP- “But you’re not Christian and you don’t believe in forgiveness.” It was not a question, but a declaration, delivered with a finality reminiscent of a judge’s gavel rendering verdict on a hapless miscreant. -SNIP-Mormons do not pretend that their understanding of Christ is identical to that of Christian orthodoxy. We embrace the New Testament and much of what the modern Christian world teaches about the Savior of the world, but...

I subscribe to a Mormon apologetic Newsletter titled FAIR (Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research). Normally it falls into my junk email account and I don't even open it, but today I had a few minutes and scanned the latest offering and was stunned to see the hypocrisy of the authors. Please note the entire email is posted below. This particular issue has a great deal of whining about those mean Christians who make the spurious claim that Mormons are not Christians, but are a cult. A couple of examples: -"Mormons are a cult" epithets into the national spotlight. In...

Ack, the headline reminds me of a grade school report card. While there seems to be no way to predict to what end Team Romney may eventually calculate itself, most every "smart" move they make serves to confirm how unsuitable Romney is for what's needed right now. He appears to be completely out of touch.Naturally, he's sensitive to being painted as a rich white Republican, which he is, for the most part. So, I get why the brain trust would think, hey, let's not go too hard on this Wall Street stuff. Maybe we need to back off a bit....

Last week, a Texas jury convicted Warren Jeffs, leader of the polygamist FLDS Church, of two counts of child sexual assault...For Americans who are increasingly interested in the religion of the two Mormons running for president, Jeffs' conviction raises what could appear to be difficult questions about modern Mormonism. There is no formal connection between Jeffs' FLDS Church and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints... From 1852 until 1890, however, the Mormon Church did publically teach and practice polygamy... Given that history, many Americans ask themselves whether Jeffs' cocktail of religious authority, polygamy and child sex represents some...

During the early 1830s, Emma Smith was beginning to have some strong suspicions that her husband, Joseph (Mormon prophet) might be involved in infidelity. While these were only suspicions, Oliver Cowdery (one of the three “witnesses” to the Book of Mormon) had proof of Smith’s adultery and confronted him on it. Smith denied to Cowdery that he was in any such activity. Cowdery would be excommunicated from the Mormon church on several counts including, “by falsely insinuating that he [Smith] was guilty of adultery.” 1 Emma’s suspicions were confirmed when she caught Joseph and 19-year-old Eliza Partridge locked in a...

Perceptions of Mormonism Monday, August 9, 2010By Dave Banack The Deseret News posted an article (”Mormons need to work to increase favor“) summarizing remarks by Gary Lawrence at the recent FAIR Conference held last week in Sandy. He addressed perceptions of Mormonism, based on data gathered by his polling firm. We’ve got some problems, it seems.Here are a few hightlights from the summary: Five times as many Americans have a strongly unfavorable view of Mormons as have a strongly favorable view of us.About three-quarters of those polled are unsure whether Mormons believe the Bible or are Christians.The overall favorable to...

...we pretty much know what kind of re-election campaign Barack Obama is going to wage: A relentlessly negative one, which...will focus almost exclusively on making the challenger seem unacceptable rather than defending the sitting president’s accomplishments. Thanks to Ben Smith at Politico, we also know roughly how the White House plans to “destroy Mitt Romney,”...By “attacking him as inauthentic, unprincipled and, in a word used repeatedly by Obama’s advisers in about a dozen interviews, ‘weird.’” Weird how, you ask? Here’s Smith: The character attacks on Romney will focus on what critics view as a makeover, both personal (skinny jeans) and...

<p>CNN Belief Blog Co-Editor Eric Marrapodi jumped into the fray on the topic with Foreman as well. He said while religious views shape Mormon politicians on a macro level, there is no evidence Mormon politicians have a "bat phone" to Utah and take orders from the leadership of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as the church is formally known.</p>

Warren Jeffs, the leader of the Fundamentalist Mormon church that practises polygamy, is likely to spend the rest of his life behind bars after he was given the maximum sentence for taking girls as young as 12 to be his brides. SNIP ...a Texas jury took just 40 minutes to hand him the toughest sentence open to them – life in prison for aggravated sexual assault and 20 years in prison for sexual assault of a child... SNIP The polygamist Mormons, under Jeffs's leadership, refused to renounce plural marriages and now have about 10,000 followers. The jury heard that Jeffs...

When Joseph Smith died in June of 1844, the Mormon Church faced a succession crisis. Mormon historian Richard S. Van Wagoner explained, “Despite frequent kidnaping and assassination attempts, Joseph Smith established no firm policies regarding presidential succession in the event of his death. The resulting confusion threw the prophetic transition into turmoil. He simply had not expected to die at thirty-eight. Never given to full disclosure to any man or woman, the prophet’s public and private statements between 1834-44 suggested at least eight different methods for succession, each pointing to different successors with some claims to validity.” (“The Making of...

The Companionship of the Holy Ghost By Elder Carlos E. Asay Of the First Quorum of the Seventy For many unmarried Latter-day Saints, particularly some of the single sisters, courtship and eternal companionship are unrealized dreams. You long for them, you know eternal companionship is a crucial part of the gospel, and yet you feel frustrated because no worthy partner is available.It is tempting to wish that I could match you with perfect companions in an instant and send you off for the eternities in joyful marriages. But such a solution would be satanic. Satan, you will remember, wanted...

In a recent letter to the editor, the author of “The right vs. the law (5/26)” compared illegal immigrants to the early leaders of the church. He observed the early church members violated the law to practice polygamy and those men were still doing what was right, therefore there are cases when it isn’t wrong to break the law. This is all true. But then he implies by this same reasoning, illegal immigrants may not be doing something wrong. This is a false analogy, because the two situations are not the same in the relevant way. What made the church...

As can be expected from a book published by Greg Kofford, Craig L. Foster’s A Different God? is well researched and engaging. This book begins by examining the rise of the religious right and the power it exerts on the current political landscape. Foster presents a good deal of information that most Latter-day Saints will not be well acquainted with, such as the difference between evangelical and fundamentalist Christians, the emergence of the charismatic movement, the rise and fall of the Moral Majority, and the subsequent establishment of the Christian Coalition. This background is particularly pertinent to the majority of...

Friday, January 5 Dear Damon, I appreciate your moderate and respectful reply to my objections. It is often hard for non-Mormons to understand how Mormons believe all we do. You at least see how Mormon beliefs and our way of life could be satisfying to educated, reasonable people, among whom you presumably would include Mitt Romney. What troubles you is the implication of belief in prophetic revelation: Would Mormons perform any dire deed for their prophet no matter how contrary to conscience? And what about the belief that the United States and the Church might combine to dominate the world...

Author: Kathryn M. Daynes Reviewer: Sarah Barringer Gordon Categories: Utah History, History of the Church Journal: 41:4 Any substantive evaluation of Kathryn Daynes's More Wives Than One should begin by emphasizing that this is a work of the highest order—Daynes brings originality, talent, and rigor to her work. Her book is likely to be extremely important; it received the Mormon History Association's Best Book Award for 2002. The award is richly deserved: the book includes innovative work in multiple dimensions of a complex and often elusive past. The book, a study of polygamy in Manti, Utah, from religious, social, and...

COLUMBIA, S.C. – The only Mormon in the South Carolina legislature is Alan Clemmons, a real estate lawyer from Myrtle Beach with a shiny bald head, natty suits, and a hyperactive Twitter feed. Rep. Clemmons ardently supported Mitt Romney for president in 2008, raising money and rallying political support for the former Massachusetts governor. He is unlikely to do so again. Clemmons says he’s distressed by the distance Romney has kept from the state since departing abruptly for Michigan just before the 2008 primary. And he finds the insinuation from some in Romney’s circle that South Carolina has a religion...

In last week’s issue I explained that even if evidence for an early Christian community in Mesoamerica could be found, that still wouldn’t satisfy most critics or prove that the Book of Mormon is true. The task of finding the evidence of a real ancient community of New World Christians becomes difficult once we understand the complexity and nature of what might be found.First, it’s important to remember that the Nephites were “Christian” for, at the most, 400 years. Second, the Nephite-Christians were a small group of persecuted believers among a sea of non-Christian believers in the ancient Americas. Some...

They are more than the people who go door-to-door asking to talk about religion. They are not the polygamists pictured in reality TV shows. That’s what the University’s student branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints wanted students to know at their Meet the Mormons event at the Institute of Religion on Wednesday. Set up like a small career fair with colorful posters, the hosts of Meet the Mormons aimed to provide an open forum to religious and non-religious students alike. “A lot of people are curious about Mormons, but reluctant to actually talk to them because...

SALT LAKE CITY— Utah’s Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) task force arrested 39 suspects on suspicion of dealing in child pornography after a month-long investigation. It is part of Operation FrostyLime Squeeze. The unique name stems from FrostWire and LimeWire.com, two of many file-sharing websites local police, the FBI and the Utah Attorney General cracked down on from February 28 to March 31. The most arrests came out of Utah County with many of the suspects in positions of trust and lived a double lifestyle, according to investigators. “These are your next door neighbors, pastor, scout master, teacher, the coach....