"Under the Banner of Heaven"

onacruse

Interesting book by John Krakauer, about the Mormons.

I'm only through chapter 7, but what an interesting (in a perverse sorta way) read.

Anybody have any personal knowledge of Colorado City, or Bountiful (aka Lister)?

Craig

Badger

I read the book too...the parallels between the WTS and the FLDS church are noticeable.

I don't know about Colo City, but If I drive to Vegas, I'll drive through that town with my 50 Cent CD Blaring.

The book is awesome. Krakauer combines history, crime and interview writing, jumps around time periods and shows how faith can be taken to extremes in spite of its beatific origins.

Carmel

Craig, have you read "Mormon Murders"?

Mr. T

Scully

Panda started a topic on this book not too long ago too:

http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/14/72447/1.ashx

I've got about 13 typed pages of quotes from the book that showed a parallel between the LDS church and the JWs.

Fascinating book overall. There have been a couple of recent programs of American Justice and Investigative Reports regarding the Fundamentalist faction of the LDS church. It just showed me that sincere people who sincerely want to do as they believe "God" tells them, will do anything, including tolerate "plural marriage" (aka "celestial marriage", aka polygamy), murder, take an adversarial position against secular laws (particularly when they clash with "God's Laws") etc.

The Mormons also have a version of Theocratic Warfare?, although they are much more honest about what it is: they call it "Lying for the Lord". They have a manner of "making use of the world" (as the JWs would call it) that they call "bleeding the Beast" - in other words, making use of the government's (the Beast) social programs such as welfare in order to support their polygamous lifestyle.

The Fifth Estate, a week before the airing of the program about the JWs, had an eye-opening exposé about The Bishop of Bountiful, Winston Blackmore (mentioned in Krakauer's book) who is the head of the Fundamentalist group of LDS followers in Canada.

Love, Scully

DanTheMan

I didn't care much for Into Thin Air, but I may give this one a chance, it sounds like it might be a good read.

Of course a bunch of Momo's wrote trashy one star reviews of the book on Amazon, same way dubs do w/CoC. LOL

Scully, how do you do that superscript TM?

Scully

Hold down your ALT key, then on the numeric pad (number lock on) type 0153

ALT + 0153 = ?

(or you could cheat and C&P from my posts LOL!)

bikerchic

I just wish he would hurry up and finish the book so I can read it!

Dan here is another on to try ³ ... I love playing with the alt keys.....?²±Æ??©¨¼»½ÇÆ¿ÀÁÂÃÄÅ, nuff for now.

Kate

DanTheMan

?

YAY!

Dan, easily thrilled

Huxley

Craig,

Read it a few months ago..the comparisons with WT life are pretty interesting.

I heard Krakauer (sp?) and some head honcho of the LDS church talking about his book on npr a while ago. The LDS leader kept emphasizing that the Fundie LDS people were not sanctioned by the church.

I thought it was a good read,

Huxley

SusanHere

If a group of Catholics go off to New Mexico, elect a female Pope, and start baptizing pigs and goats (the 4-legged variety), would you be so quick to continue referring to them as "Catholics" and malign the entire multi-million member true Catholic organization for the action of some lunatics who are obviously NOT following the teachings of the Catholic church?

Probably not, though some in here might.

Same with Mormons and that book. It is NOT about the actual Mormon Church (LDS) but is about a small group of people who have no affiliation with the Church, have gone off and created their own, with their own lifestyle and rules. It is truly a shame that they continue to use the name "Mormon" when they are not members and probably very few ever were members.

No, Mormons do not do "Lying for the Lord" nor do they "bleed the beast". We do not encourage welfare amongst our people. That some people who are, in fact, NOT part of the Mormon Church choose to do these, and other reprehensible things, should in no way reflect negatively upon the Church.

The book makes it clear they are not members of the LDS Church. They don't even WANT to be. They know their behavior and lifestyle would not be tolerated by us.

SusanHere

"Under the Banner of Heaven"

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