Word: mormon
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...Mormon teenager in the 1970s, I was constantly admonished by church elders to keep my body strong and pure - free of alcohol, drugs and nicotine, and even of the caffeine in Coca-Cola. My spiritual health, according to church doctrine, was contingent on my physical health, as if my soul and my bloodstream were connected. These teachings were outlined in the Word of Wisdom, a crucial prophetic revelation given to Joseph Smith, the church's founder. Smith had a unique conception of God. Far from being some misty omniscient presence, God was a being of flesh, bone and hair...
...Christian sects that I know of place such an emphasis on physical development, or link it so closely to moral virtue, which makes Mormon Utah a fitting setting for the Olympic Games. The athletic prowess revered by ancient Athenians is equally important to modern Mormons. Steve Young, the Hall-of-Fame-bound NFL quarterback and a distant relation of Brigham Young, was, for the duration of his career, the quintessence of Mormon manhood?an earthly model for aspiring gods. No wonder that Utah, in survey after survey, has ranked first in the nation in longevity and last in the prevalence...
...What's ironic about all this is that the Mormons, by preserving in its purest form the Greco-Roman worship of the body, have in some ways outstripped the Olympic athletes themselves. Good health is no longer, and hasn't been for some time now, an Olympic ideal. Performance trumps all. Between their indulgence in harrowing training regimens that warp young athletes' sexual development and the widespread use of drugs and supplements meant to induce short bursts of speed and power, a lot of today's would-be medallists might be regarded, in Mormon terms, as defiled and deficient...
...Green points to the pictures of his 26 children and five wives above the kitchen table and says, "That is my brag wall." At 52, Green is not ready to stop bragging. Three more children are on the way. A self-proclaimed "fundamentalist Mormon," Green lives with his extensive family in the remote desert of western Utah. He believes he is carrying out God's will with his polygamous lifestyle...
...Green was born in Salt Lake City. He was brought up a Mormon, and did two years of missionary work for the church in Indiana and Michigan before returning to Utah to study church history. "It was then I saw polygamy had not been abandoned; it just went underground," he says. For proclaiming his belief in polygamy, Green underwent a four-hour excommunication trial in 1980. "For them it was a ticket to hell," Green says. "I saw it as a graduation...