Introduction
If you’re picking up this book, you may already know that Mormonism is one of the world’s fastest-growing religions. With more than 5 million members in the United States, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the fifth-largest religious body in the nation. It also has nearly 7 million more people on the rolls around the world. Almost all this growth has happened in the last 25 years, making Mormonism a hot topic that many people want to understand better.
In this book, we help you do just that. If you don’t know a Mormon from a Moravian, you find the basics here for most everything you need to understand. We don’t assume that you have any background. At the same time, even if you are a Mormon, you may find information in this book that helps you understand your religion more thoroughly and with fresh perspective.
About This Book
Don’t feel that you have to read this book straight through from cover to cover. Each chapter is a self-contained unit, designed to give you information about that particular topic. Where relevant, we also include cross-references to show you where to find more information. This way, you can find what you want quickly and skip over the stuff that seems less important to you.
One more thing: Although we’re both practicing members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the views you find in this book are unofficial and don’t necessarily represent the opinions of the Church’s leadership. Furthermore, although we tried our best to capture the broadest cross-section possible and to present a range of viewpoints, we certainly can’t claim that every Mormon you meet will agree with everything we say. Throughout the book, we refer you to a few other books that the Church does produce and sanction, and we also point you to the Church’s official Web site, www.lds.org.
Conventions Used in This Book
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has some style preferences that we adopted for this book. You won’t see the term Mormon Church here, because Mormon is a nickname and the Church would rather have people use its official name. We do use LDS Church for short, instead of spelling out the whole name each time. You’ll also see the word Mormon used as an adjective or a noun to refer to members of the Church.
In addition, you may notice a bit of fuss about the capitalization of church. Here’s the deal: Whenever we’re referring to other denominations or to churches in general, we use little c. But when we’re talking about the LDS Church as a specific denomination, we use capital C.
When it comes to the Bible, we stick with what Mormons love best: the good ol’ King James Version (KJV for short). Because the other Mormon scriptures are distinctively Mormon, they only come in one lingo — and it reads very much like the KJV. When we reference a particular verse or range of verses in any of the scriptures, we follow the standard: For example, in the Bible, Matthew 10:1 refers to Matthew as the book, 10 as the chapter number, and 1 as the verse.
To add a little spice, we threw in a few formatting conventions:
Anytime we introduce a new term, we italicize it and define it.
Web sites or e-mail addresses appear in monofont to help them stand out.
Anytime we suggest typing keywords into an Internet search engine, we put them in boldface.
Foolish Assumptions
While writing this book, we assumed that many of our readers aren’t going to be Mormons, but some will be. Maybe you fit into one of these groups:
You’ve got Mormon friends, neighbors, relatives, or co-workers, and you’re naturally curious about their faith.
You’ve heard something or read an article about Mormonism, and it made you wonder what Mormons believe.
You’re thinking of joining the LDS Church and want to know more about it.
You’re a new Mormon convert trying to better understand what you’ve gotten yourself into.
You’re an established Mormon, and you want this book to give to someone else who fits in one of the first four categories. Or maybe you like to read different perspectives on your own faith.
How This Book Is Organized
Even though Mormonism is a relatively young religion, packing more than 180 years of history and belief into one introductory book is still a tough job. Obviously, we’ve had to omit some things. Our goal here is to give you the down-and-dirty (actually, make that down-and-squeaky-clean) story of the Mormon religion and its people.
To make it easy for you to find exactly what you’re looking for, we divided this book into several parts, each covering a broad topic. Each part contains several chapters that relate more specifically to that topic.
Part I: What the Mormon Faith Is All About
This part deals with the basics: Who are the Mormons, and what do they believe? Here you find the Mormon view on the meaning of life, the nature of God, and what happens to people after they die. You also read about the Mormon concept of priesthood and the idea of a restored church with 12 apostles and a living prophet. We explore why Mormons emphasize family and what it means to believe that families can be together forever.
Part II: Eternal Rituals and Endless Meetings
This part outlines the day-to-day workings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, from the activities and organizations of the local congregations to the hierarchy of leaders at Church headquarters in Salt Lake City. We help you understand what to do if you’re invited to a Mormon church serv-ice, baptism, or funeral. We also take a sneak peek inside the temple, the most sacred place in Mormon life, and explain why temples are so significant for Mormons.
Part III: Holy Books and Sacred History
In this part, we walk you through the four sacred texts that Latter-day Saints regard as scripture (the Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and Pearl of Great Price) and explain what Mormons believe about continuing revelation. We also spend some time with the pioneers, giving you the highlights — and lowlights — of Mormon history from 1820 onward.
Part IV: Mormonism Today
This part explores Mormonism as a worldwide religion, focusing on its rapid international growth and the role of missionary work. Here you get to understand who those clean-shaven, well-dressed Mormon missionaries are and what their lives are like. We also give you Mormon perspectives on some controversial issues, such as racism, polygamy, homosexuality, and women’s roles. Then we delve into Mormon spiritual practices, from paying tithing and remaining chaste to praying daily and reading the scriptures. Finally, we help you understand the Mormon emphasis on self-reliance and look at Mormon culture, from the highbrow (the Mormon Tabernacle Choir) to the lowbrow (green Jell-O salad).
Part V: The Part of Tens
Every For Dummies book has a part of tens, which is a quick and entertaining way to get the basics. Here, we include answers to ten frequently asked questions about Mormonism, introduce you to ten (well, almost) famous Latter-day Saints, and profile ten places to visit if you’re interested in finding out more about Mormon history.
Icons Used in This Book
This book uses the following icons to help you find information you need or to highlight ideas you may find particularly helpful.
Where to Go from Here
Mormonism For Dummies is like a big Sunday buffet at Grandma’s house. You can eat as many of the yeast rolls as you want, and you don’t have to touch the peas if you don’t want to. In other words, in this book we bring a little bit of everything to the table: history, doctrine, fun facts, spiritual disciplines, culture, and scripture. You can go to any section and discover Mormonism, choosing what interests you the most.
If you’re coming to this book with a specific question in mind, feel free to look up that topic in the index or table of contents and start with that section. Others may want to start with Chapter 1, which gives an overview of the whole Mormon topic. There’s no wrong way to eat this buffet — just enjoy the meal.