While surfing on the Web recently, I came across T. Joe Willey’s review of the book Under the Banner of Heaven, by Jon Krakauer. I am a member of the Mormon Church and have been so for more than thirty years. Therefore, I was very disturbed when I read statements Willey’s review makes about the Mormon religion that are simply not true.

One glaring example is this: "Mormons do not believe that Jesus died on the cross for man’s sins." That is absurd, of course; we do! All of our official doctrines can be easily found on the Church’s Web site, including this one: "Through His suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane and by giving His life on the cross—that is, by performing the Atonement—Jesus Christ saves us from our sins (1 Peter 2:21) as we follow Him."

Willey’s review seems to paint the Mormon Church as somehow responsible for the crimes of fanatics who break off from our church. The only true Mormons are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. All of the so-called "fundamentalist Mormons" referred to in Willey’s review are not authorized to use the name Mormon because that is an official copyrighted term for members of the Church, as is Latter-day Saints and the LDS Church. Surely, people who call themselves "Mormons" but are not really members of our church should not be held out as examples of what the LDS Church teaches or believes.

The worst aspect of the review is that it takes up the thinly guised slander of the book it reviews by consistently juxtaposing renegade apostates from the faith with authentic Mormonism. Take this passage, for instance: "[Krakauer] discusses the recent abduction of Utah teenager Elizabeth Smart, whose ’forced marriage’ raises questions as to whether the practice [of polygamy] has been fully renounced." Really! So every egotistical maniac who twists Mormon doctrine to suit their depraved desires becomes a case in point to question the current position of the church they spurn?

Why is such garbage spewed out when the LDS Church renounced polygamy over a century ago? For thirty years I have studied the doctrines of the Church and met hundreds of its members and many of its top leaders, and I have only the finest admiration for the integrity and Christ-like love and service that the vast majority exhibit. I certainly don’t judge the Church by the occasional fanatic I encounter, and I am deeply offended when the Church is judged by its excommunicated renegade outcasts.

I suggest that if members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church want to know the facts about real Mormons, they get it from the official LDS Web site, not by trying to find it in slanderous books such as the one reviewed. If I wanted to learn about Adventism, I would go to sites like Spectrum’s; I wouldn’t want to learn about Adventism from the likes of Anthony Hoekema, or J. K. van Baalen, who obviously have nothing but slander to say about your church.

I suggest we remember the saying: "People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones."

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