Mormons Say Polygamy Morally Wrong

By Amy Choate-Nielsen

Deseret News
Published: Sunday, Jan. 15, 2012 7:00 p.m. MST

David Letterman knows how to get a laugh.Like most comics, he riffs on the day’s news, deadpans the camera and revels in audacity.”Oh, did you hear about this?” the host of CBS’ Late Show with David Letterman asked his audience recently. “A campaign staffer on the Newt Gingrich campaign was fired because he was making negative comments about Mormons. I thought, now, wait a minute — isn’t Newt in favor of multiple wives?”
Laughter rumbled from the audience followed by applause. The polygamy punch line is a familiar one when it comes to poking fun at Mormons — as though Mormons and polygamy are synonymous in mainstream media. Ironically, the practice that’s most linked to Mormons is a practice most Mormons oppose, according to a groundbreaking new study of Mormons in America released Thursday by the Pew Research Center‘s Forum on Religion and Public Life.

According to the study, members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints unequivocally reject polygamy — only 2 percent said the practice is morally acceptable — evidence of a yawning gap in what Mormons believe and how they are perceived. Mormons’ opinions are overwhelmingly conservative, the study shows, but in many ways, their views are also surprising — especially when it comes to opinions on moral issues, divorce, homosexuality and polygamy. Read more

Mormons’ Focus on Marriage & Family Highlighted in Pew Survey

SMITHFIELD — After dinner, three baths, four bedtime stories and a half-a-dozen goodnight kisses for 2-year-old twins Brock and Isaac and 6-year-old Ellie, Erin and Brian Thompson finally sink into the couch with weary smiles.

Being parents is just what they always wanted. And they love it.

“Of course we have our crazy moments,” Thompson says, “but for the most part we just try to find the good things in the day and remember that they’re only going to be little for so long.”

As members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Thompsons believe that maintaining a strong marriage and raising and teaching children are essential keys to happiness and their most important responsibilities on earth.

In fact, 81 percent of Mormons say being a good parent is “one of the most important things in life,” according to a new survey by the Pew Research Center‘s Forum on Religion & Public Life — the first survey of Mormons about Mormons, by a non-LDS research organization.

The survey of more than 1,000 self-identified Latter-day Saints from across the country asked how accepted Mormons feel in American culture, as well as their thoughts on religious practices, political issues and family roles.

The survey showed that Mormons are more likely to be married than the general population, 67 percent of the sample size compared to 52 percent of the general public. Read more

Landmark Pew Study of Christian Mormon Beliefs

As the “Mormon moment” extends into 2012, the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life today released a groundbreaking new survey, the first ever published by a non-LDS research organization to focus exclusively on members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and their beliefs, values, perceptions and political preferences.

Entitled “Mormons in America: Certain in Their Beliefs, Uncertain of Their Place in Society,” the survey was conducted between Oct. 25 and Nov. 16, 2011 among a national sample of 1,019 respondents who identified themselves as Mormons. The results validate a number of long-held stereotypes (most American Mormons are white, well-educated, politically conservative and religiously observant) while providing a few interesting surprises (care for the poor and needy is high on the list of LDS priorities, while drinking coffee and watching R-rated movies aren’t as taboo among the rank and file as you might think).

“While this survey comes amid a contentious election campaign, it is not solely or even chiefly about politics,” said Luis Lugo, Pew Research Center director, in the published survey’s preface. “Rather, we hope that it will contribute to a broader public understanding of Mormons and Mormonism at a time of great interest in both.”

For example, in one very interesting section of the new survey, respondents were asked several questions about what is essential to being a good Mormon. According to the survey, 80 percent said “believing Joseph Smith saw God the Father and Jesus Christ” is essential to being a good Mormon, 73 percent said “working to help the poor,” 51 percent said “regular Family Home Evenings,” 49 percent said “not drinking coffee and tea” and 32 percent said “not watching R-rated movies. Read more

Why Don’t Mormon Women Hold the Priesthood?

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (inadvertently called by friends of other faiths, the “Mormon Church”) holds women in the highest respect. The Lord has given worthy male members of the Church, the specific responsibility to administer the priesthood of the Church. Women in the Church are given different responsibilities and callings to serve, teach, and help other members. Below, D. Lauritsen, a Mormon professor, shares an answer as to why Mormon women don’t hold the priesthood:

Why Don’t Mormon Women Hold the Priesthood?

Brief Answer: Though Jesus Christ was the earliest, kindest, and most outspoken proponent and defender of womanhood of whom we have written record (Matthew 15:21–28; John 7:37–50; John 4:6–30; John 8:3–11), he nevertheless did not confer the ecclesiastical responsibilities of the Aaronic or Melchizedek Priesthood on women. He has continued to follow that pattern in his restored Church.

Detailed Answer: Why the Lord established and continues to follow the pattern mentioned above has not been revealed. But if the Lord chooses to change this pattern, his Saints are assured that he will first reveal it through the living prophet, for “surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7).

Nevertheless, the Lord has revealed major changes in the role of women in his restored Church, beginning with his establishment of the relief Society on March 17, 1842. With the exception of the grueling years of Church persecution, flight, and relocation, the relief Society has steadily grown in numbers, influence, and accomplishments. Its humble rebirth began in the Utah Territory in 1854 when sixteen women responded to President Brigham young’s exhortation to form a women’s organization to make clothing for Native American women and children. By 1866, the local “Indian relief Society” had become known throughout the Church as relief Society, and by 1880, the organization had units in each of three hundred wards. Read more

Church Gives Donations To Fisherman In Japan

Eight months after the earthquake and tsunami hit in Japan, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (inadvertently called by friends of other faiths, the “Mormon Church“) contributed donations to the fishermen of Kuji and the small village of Noda Mura in Japan.

The fisherman in those cities were devastated when the tsunami destroyed almost all of their equipment. The Church donated “three trucks, 4,500 nets, 3,000 octopus cages and various other fishing supplies to the local fishermen’s cooperative” to the city of Kuji, and “trucks with refrigeration equipment and fish tanks, a fork lift, a large-volume digital scale and 70 large containers for hauling the day’s catch” in Noda Mura. In Kuji, the head of the fisherman’s co-op, Kenichiro Saikachi, thanked the Church saying, “For us who received the shock of this great disaster, the donation today from your church is a reassuring act of kindness.” This is a part of the ongoing effort of the Church in contributing to the welfare of those affected by the disaster in Japan. “Both the mayor and the head of the co-op were visibly moved by the help they had received from people they were not aware of before the earthquake and tsunami.”

To read the full story, please visit the official Mormon news website of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Learn more about the Church humanitarian aid program.

Mormons Aid with Drought Relief in Africa

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (inadvertently called by friends of other faiths, the “Mormon Church“) is working together with other organizations, to assist in drought relief efforts in Africa. Millions are in need of assistance as the past several years have been harsh drought conditions. The Church partnering to provide water, hygiene kits, medical supplies, as well as medical training. the Church is also working on projects in the future that would help the people of Africa be more self-reliant. These projects include digging wells, installing pumps, and sanitizing water. This example of assistance given by the Church and other organizations, shows that there is a great need for additional Christ like assistance around the world.

 With an estimated 13 million people in Eastern Africa in need of assistance, the conditions there being the driest recorded in the past 50 years, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is working with various other organizations to coordinate the distribution of aid in Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, and Uganda.

In Dadaab, Kenya, the world’s largest complex of refugee camps is already full, with an estimated half million people living there. Tens of thousands of people are living outside of the complex due to lack of space and supplies. In September, an average of 1,000 people arrived each day.

For a full report, please visit the official Mormon news website for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (“Mormons”)

BYU Student Innovation Brings Water to Africa

Brigham Young University engineering students have created a well-drilling system that works on manpower.  The drill is inexpensive, easy to operate and easy to move.

Other water-drilling alternatives in the region either can’t dig deep enough or cost too much, sometimes upwards of $15,000. But the team’s device has the potential to drill a 150- to 250-foot-deep hole in a matter of days—all for about $2,000. [1]  The team created the drill for WHOLives.org, a nonprofit dedicated to providing clean water, better health and more opportunities to people living in impoverished communities. The organization is currently focusing its drilling efforts on Tanzania, but it has plans to expand its operations to other countries. The project is also co-sponsored by the Ira A. Fulton College of Engineering and Technology.

The drill can be operated by four people.  The project has the potential to affect millions of lives.  For official LDS news and updates regarding humanitarian efforts in Africa and other parts of the world, as well as world reports on Church events, visit the LDS Newsroom.

Mormons Spearhead International Charities

An article on Mormons in Business dot org talks about Russell Ellwanger, who currently lives in Israel and is the CEO of TowerJazz, a publicly traded semiconductor company on NASDAQ.  TowerJazz is headquartered near Nazareth, Israel, with a U.S subsidiary located in Newport Beach, California and facilities in China and Japan.  Margret, his German wife (whom he met on a mission to Germany, where she was also serving) spends nearly all of her time and resources managing the various charitable projects of forPeace.  Those projects now serve hundreds of thousands in Israel, Cambodia, and now Kenya.  The programs are innovative and therefore amazingly successful.

Micro-Loans?  Try Micro-Savings?

The Tabitha Project in Cambodia

Margret believes that the micro-loan programs functioning in many third-world countries get families off on the wrong foot from day one of their involvement.  Her incredible projects in Cambodia begin with micro-savings, and have allowed  1.5 million Cambodians to lift themselves from poverty into the middle class.  Currently, nearly 300,000 Khmer Cambodians are participating.

One of the reasons for the success of Marget’s charities is that there is no “rich big-brother” looking down on the needy, and no do-gooders going in and doing a project, then departing.  The latter means that the project breaks down and becomes derelict, while the former ends up being no real help at all.  The forPEACE organization has locals and permanent residents on the ground where help is needed.  They are always there with consistent help.  Also, the programs are self-driven.

The initiative in Cambodia is called “Tabitha,” named after a biblical woman who went around doing good. Tabitha was founded in 1994 by Canadian Janne Ritskeswith a goal to restore Khmer people hope and confidence and enable the poorest of the poor in Cambodia to improve their health, living conditions, and lifestyle. Here is a brief explanation of how the micro-savings program works.

The program has four main phases: The micro-savings program to teach money management principles;  cottage industry to teach job skills and to  generate paid positions;  the building of wells to provide families with clean water to improve health and living conditions; and house building, to  improve family comfort and living conditions.  By the time a family works through the four phases, they have moved from abject poverty to the middle class.

In the beginning, the family sets a goal to save 25 cents each week.  Every member of the family works hard to reach this goal, with everyone, even the children, participating.  At the end of 10 weeks, the family has saved $2.50.  Tabitha employees visit enrolled families each week and collect their savings.  After 10 weeks, Tabitha pays the family 10% interest, $0.25,
bringing their total to $2.75.   Each family then decides what to do with their savings. Many buy 5 baby chicks at $0.50 each.

After 10 more weeks of saving, families have another $2.75 to decide how to spend.   They sell the chickens they raised free range for $10 each.   With $52.75 they often buy:  A sack of rice – 50 kilos  for $40.00;  20 more chicks – $10.00;   Second hand clothes for their children.  As situations improve, families begin to save 50 cents each week.  Now families are able to buy and sell more chickens at a profit.  Eventually, they have just over $200, enough to purchase 30 chickens, or two pigs, or seeds to grow produce (making the family healthier, and to sell for profit), or clothes for everyone, or for rice.  Some choose to save $15.00 toward the cost of a well.

Families increase their savings to $5.00 each week.  They continue to earn 10% interest from forPEACE, funded by donations.  At the next phase, they may purchase a water pump, buy more chickens, save more toward the cost of a well, or cultivate a garden.  Families are now selling chickens, pigs, and produce, clothing the entire family, and have a well for clean water.  They begin to consider building a real house, after living in a hovel or out in the open.

Silk products produced by the Tabitha project

Some families enter the cottage industries established by forPEACE, especially the silk-weaving industry, which creates and sells gorgeous, high-quality purses, scarves, and other precious items.  Now the children can go to schools (forPEACE is building schools, too), and the family can purchase pots and pans, cement posts for a house, and a bicycle for use in their businesses.  When families are self-sufficient,  after about five years of 10-week cycles, they graduate from the Tabitha Savings Program, and have built a house costing under $1,000.  Tabitha sponsors house-building trips for volunteers who want to come help build houses.  When volunteers arrive, the footings are already in place, and they are trained by the Khmer.

The family-run businesses include produce and livestock farms; transportation businesses; roadside stores and vendors; silversmith shops;
and the silk weaving, the largest cottage industry.  Each village weaving
leader negotiates and purchases silk from silkworm farmers.   Tabitha weavers dye, spin, and weave the silk.  Silk fabric is transported to seamstresses.   Some women sew in their villages. Others commute to Tabitha headquarters in Phnom Penh.

There are many benefits from these cottage industries:  Silk sales pay for 80% of Tabitha administrative costs;  Cambodians learn to take pride in Cambodian products; and women are given the opportunity to earn a
respectable living.  Tabitha has built over 7,000 wells and 200 ponds and
has completed 9 schools.  Over 10,000 volunteers from across the globe have helped build over 4,000 houses.

Other Projects

In Israel, Margret works with Israeli Arabs in Nazareth to lift their educational accomplishments, which lag behind their Jewish counterparts.  Some projects aim to bring together Arab and Israeli youth to increase understanding.  In the Negev desert in southern Israel, formerly nomadic Beduouin women engage in cottage industries such as weaving and creating herbal products to forward the literacy of Bedouin women.

In Kenya, forPEACE is partnering with Global Outreach and building an internet cafe and guesthouse in western Kenya, connecting rural villages with the world through cyberspace.

For official LDS news and updates regarding humanitarian efforts in Africa and other parts of the world, as well as world reports on Church events, visit the LDS Newsroom.

Latter-day Saints Help with Tornado Cleanup

In the spring of 2011, the southern and mid-western U.S. states suffered from a record-breaking rash of tornadoes.  On May 7, 2011, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints sponsored a massive volunteer project to help the people of Birmingham, Alabama, and Tennessee who were hit by many tornadoes. More than1,500 volunteers came from the greater Atlanta, Birmingham and other surrounding areas.  This is in addition to the mobilization of local Latter-day Saints who offered help in their own neighborhoods.

Organization for the wide-spread cleanup operation was from a “command post” established at a Mormon meetinghouse in Birmingham.  People needing help were represented by green dots on a large map of the area.  Local congregations found those in need by canvassing their own neighborhoods and passing information along.  This system is helped along by the existence of “Home Teachers” and “Visiting Teachers” in local congregations, called “Wards.”  Home Teachers are two men assigned to certain families in the neighborhood, and Visiting Teachers are two women assigned families to watch over.  They can pass information about emergencies up the line to bishops (who lead congregations), and then up to central leadership in the Church, which can then send help downward, if necessary.

Paul Norton was one who received help.  Though fortunate that all family members and pets survived, his home was left almost uninhabitable.  A team of 25 Mormon Helping Hands showed up to help.  Paul said he has never seen such a wonderful group people who just wanted to help and get nothing in return.

For more information about the official humanitarian efforts of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints visit the LDS Newsroom.

Mormon Woman Serves Street Children in Mongolia

The capital city of Mongolia has some 5000 street children, some hiding from abuse, some who were separated from nomad parents, some simply abandoned. Some 3000 of them live in manholes—sewage tunnels. They don’t qualify for government help because they aren’t orphans. A member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, whose members are often called Mormons by others, from Colorado works to help make their lives more bearable.

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Naranjargal Thompson became a Mormon in her native Mongolia. She came to the United States to attend Brigham Young University, a Mormon-owned school. It was there that she began following in her mother’s footsteps by seeking out service projects. In time, she began to focus her efforts on children in the United States, the Ukraine, and Mongolia. The children in Mongolia naturally capture her heart. 90 percent are abused and ill, but she says that despite their difficult lives, they are filled with joy.

In time, she co-founded Care4Kids with Valentina Anderson. One of their projects is to create care stations where the street children can get food and have a safe place to sleep. There are also plans to build a playground for a Mongolian orphanage.

Another project benefits a residential school for nomadic children. In order for them to get an education, they live at the school in dormitories. Although the schools provide an education and a place to live (one that is unsanitary and crowded), they don’t give the children after school activities, and the children are often desperately homesick during the long, unstructured hours when they are not in class. Nara is creating a library for these children, filled with books by the world’s great authors as well as Mongolian authors. She hopes they will find in these books comfort, inspiration, and motivation to stay in school despite the hardships so they can have a better life when they grow up. The library will also have a media corner so children can learn about computers, study math and science, and develop important skills for adulthood.

Nara is a homemaker with three children. She does this work simply out of love for others. Mormons are taught to follow the example of Jesus Christ, and Nara is clearly following that mandate.

Read more about Nara.

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