Word: mormon
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Your article on the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was very well done [RELIGION, Aug. 4]. I have been a Mormon all my life, attending meetings, paying tithes and offerings, teaching children and adults in church classes, etc. We Mormons believe that the sacrifice of worldly goods is an important principle, requiring faith in God as it does, but we also believe in freedom to exercise moral agency--which means, as far as monetary contributions are concerned, each member is free to pay or not. Your report made it seem as if Mormons are under a great...
...Internal Revenue Service should study the Mormon church's use of power and guilt to collect a 10% tithe from its members. The IRS might find out what happens to church members who fall short of the 10%: privileges and positions are withheld; there is no admission to any temple; and they cannot reach the top rank of the three levels of heaven. TRACY A. BREEDING Denton...
...interest your report on the church. It is amusing how the media are so intent on primarily examining the financial holdings of my church. My voluntary tithes and offerings stem from my sincere belief in the divine origins, doctrines and destiny of this religion. The real strength of the Mormon church can be found in what it offers mankind spiritually, not monetarily. PETER W. MADSEN West Jordan, Utah
...Mormons are "nice" only to people who agree with them. I am not a Mormon, but I have countless friends who have been badly hurt by this cultlike faith. Their crime? Daring to want a more sophisticated intellectual life than their religion allows. After being raised in the suffocating sweetness of family and faith, they find themselves cast out, and although they relish their escape and freedom, a part of them will always ache for that absolutist belonging. Next time you write about Mormonism, look at all sides of this unusual, politically powerful and often cruel religion. SEAN GARDNER Santa...
Your story read like a pitch for recruits to the Mormon church. The assertion that Joseph Smith was "a simple farm boy" who was given tablets of ancient scriptural writings that were "taken up again to heaven" cries out for some investigative reporting. And if God speaks directly to the Mormon leaders, why did it take him until 1978, two decades after the start of the civil rights movement and 115 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, to reveal to his chosen people what most others already knew--that racism is wrong? LARS OPLAND Palmer, Alaska...