Why are people wary of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (known as Mormons or LDS)? The media is having a heyday with anything related to Mormonism, from examining what the Mormon presidential candidate believes to reviews and commentary about The Book of Mormon Broadway musical that has attracted vast audiences. But when you’ve been a Mormon all your life, and you know that Mormons are like anyone else—members sharing the same religious beliefs, but with diverse personalities, every socioeconomic group, and varying political opinions, it’s hard to know what all the fuss is about.
An article in BU Today (Boston University), Why We’re Afraid of Mormons, offers a few insights, stating that many people have prejudices because they are uninformed. Some believe that the Church of Jesus Christ may hide polygamists, and there are questions about sacred undergarments, according to a staff reporter for the publication, Rich Barlow.
He interviewed scholar Christine Hutchison-Jones whose doctoral dissertation, Reviling and Revering the Mormons: Defining American Values, 1890-2008 takes a look at the reasons Mormonism has not been assimilated and accepted into the cultural mainstream.
When asked why negative images of Mormons still exist today, she explained:
There are a couple of reasons. You had the rise of evangelical Christianity in politics, and for conservative Protestant Christians, Mormons are not Christians; Mormons are a cult. So you had an increase in the amount of anti-Mormon propaganda coming out of religious communities.
The other people who are uncomfortable with Mormons are socially and politically liberal Americans. Polls ask, would you vote for a Mormon presidential candidate? People who self-identify as liberal have a tendency to say no. There’s a tendency to see Mormons as hegemony, as if they were en masse in thrall to church leadership. The Moral Majority reached out to Mormons, and because of that association, liberals tend to see Mormons as off-limits. I had to get over some of that myself. That was the expectation I came into my research with. I headed off to the Mormon History Association national conference, and the group of scholars there are by and large Mormon, and they are not in any kind of political lockstep. There’s a wide diversity of opinion.
Mr. Barlow also asked Hutchison-Jones what the perception of Mormonism says about America’s ideals and values. She responded:
It boils down to our sense of ourselves as a nation in which church and state are separate. I would argue that Americans aren’t separating all religion from all politics. We’re just not comfortable with groups that don’t fit into a generally moderate, Protestant mold. I’ve got a colleague who did his PhD on images of conservative Christians as villains in Hollywood cinema. You can almost certainly tell in any crime drama that if somebody quotes the Bible, you’re later going to find out that they’re a psychopathic killer.
And we’re nervous about groups who openly say the church should be involved in our politics, whatever that church might be for that group. And Mormons wear their religion on their sleeve. The average Mormon spends something like 20 hours per week in activities at their local congregation. It’s really the core and center of their community, and they are absolutely open that their religion informs their social and political values. And Americans don’t like that.
Another article, Many Americans uninformed, but still wary of Mormon beliefs in USA Today points out additional reasons for skepticism:
•Mormons are unfamiliar to many. There are 6 million, adults and children, accounting for fewer than 2% of the U.S. population and 76% live in just a handful of Western states.
•Outspoken evangelical pastors…call Mormonism a “cult,” saying followers aren’t Christians… Christian private schools and home-schooling associations specify in their statement of faith that the Bible is the only Scripture, thereby excluding Mormons, who add three more holy books.
•Unlike Judaism, Mormonism is not a faith commonly studied in comparative religion classes. When Mormons show up in history books, it’s generally limited to a saga of persecution (they were driven from the Midwest to Utah in the 19th century) and legal conflicts over polygamy. Polygamy was banned by the Church in 1890. But many Americans are schooled by the fundamentalist Mormon splinter groups pictured in Big Love and Sister Wives on cable TV and in crime headlines, such as the trial and conviction of polygamist leader Warren Jeffs.
On a positive note, the article also cites surveys conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion and American Life which depict the traditional values of Mormons:
Most (71%) of adult Mormons are married, compared with 54% of the nation. And 61% have had at least some college education, compared with half of the overall population. College-educated Mormons also have the highest level of commitment to religious orthodoxy: 84% say they follow the teachings “wholeheartedly.”
Other Christians, not so much.
On Pew Forum’s 2010 U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey, which asked 32 questions on the Bible, major religious figures and core beliefs and practices, the average score was 16 correct. Just 19% of Protestants knew the basic tenet that salvation is through faith alone, not actions as well. Who scored best? Atheists, Jews and Mormons.
Mormons’ strong community structure, with significantly higher rates of church attendance than most other Christians, makes them a potent organized force, whether for joining in relief programs, campaigning for a moral cause or proselytizing by those ubiquitous young missionaries knocking on doors from Peoria to Peru.
I have to admit that as a member of the LDS Church, sometimes media exploitations feel blasphemous and suck the breath out of me. It is disturbing when your deepest beliefs are indelicately dangled as insignificant pawns to sensationalize what is sacred.
I greatly respect those who have asked me, as a Mormon, about the Church, instead of being swayed by those who are uninformed or prejudiced.
I was having such a discussion one day with a good friend who had interacted closely with several Mormon families. As we talked, he explained why the people in his church were skeptical of Mormons.
“You (meaning Mormons) are just too much,” he said. “You are always helpful and you’re so nice.” I told him thank you, but he was quick to correct me.
“No…no,” he said. “You don’t understand what I mean. You are nice and happy. But people aren’t used to that—they don’t trust that anyone is really that way. You’re just too good to be true—no one can be that good!”
I could only hope that he and the people in his church would continue to watch. They would observe lots of imperfections and mistakes—but also would come to understand that Mormons are devout people who deeply love and worship Jesus Christ by following His teachings.
And they all cried with one voice, saying: Yea, we believe all the words which thou hast spoken unto us; and also, we know of their surety and truth, because of the Spirit of the Lord Omnipotent, which has wrought a mighty change in us, or in our hearts, that we have no more disposition to do evil, but to do good continually (Mosiah 5:2; Book of Mormon).
This article was written by Jan Meyer, a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
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