Portal:Latter Day Saint movement

The Latter Day Saint movement (also called the LDS movement, LDS restorationist movement, or Smith–Rigdon movement) is the collection of independent church groups that trace their origins to a Christian Restorationist movement founded in the United States by Joseph Smith in the late 1820s.

Collectively, these churches have nearly 18 million nominal members. The vast majority, more than 17 million, belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). About 250,000 belong to the Community of Christ, formerly known as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The remainder belong to other denominations with memberships generally ranging in the thousands. The predominant theology of the churches in the movement is Mormonism, which sees itself as restoring again on Earth the early Christian church; their members are most commonly known as Mormons. An additional doctrine of the church allows for prophets to receive and publish modern-day revelations.

A minority of Latter Day Saint adherents, such as members of Community of Christ, have been influenced by Protestant theologies while maintaining certain distinctive beliefs and practices including continuing revelation, an open canon of scripture and building temples. Other groups include the Remnant Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, which supports lineal succession of leadership from Smith's descendants, and the more controversial Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, which defends the practice of polygamy. One source has estimated that over 400 denominations have sprung from founder Joseph Smith's original movement. (Full article...)

Chamberlin circa 1905

Ralph Vary Chamberlin (January 3, 1879 – October 31, 1967) was an American biologist, ethnographer, and historian from Salt Lake City, Utah. He was a faculty member of the University of Utah for over 25 years, where he helped establish the School of Medicine and served as its first dean, and later became head of the zoology department. He also taught at Brigham Young University and the University of Pennsylvania, and worked for over a decade at the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University, where he described species from around the world.

Chamberlin was a prolific taxonomist who named over 4,000 new animal species in over 400 scientific publications. He specialized in arachnids (spiders, scorpions, and relatives) and myriapods (centipedes, millipedes, and relatives), ranking among the most prolific arachnologists and myriapodologists in history. He described over 1,400 species of spiders, 1,000 species of millipedes, and the majority of North American centipedes, although the quantity of his output was not always matched with quality, leaving a mixed legacy to his successors. He also did pioneering ethnobiological studies with the Goshute and other indigenous people of the Great Basin, cataloging indigenous names and cultural uses of plants and animals. Chamberlin was celebrated by his colleagues at the University of Utah, however he was disliked among some arachnologists, including some of his former students. After retirement he continued to write, publishing on the history of education in his home state, especially that of the University of Utah. (Full article...)

Map of Wisconsin highlighting Walworth County where the unincorporated community of Voree is located

Voree (/vɔːriː/) is an unincorporated community in the Town of Spring Prairie in Walworth County, Wisconsin, United States. It is best known as the headquarters of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Strangite), a denomination of the Latter Day Saint movement. According to James Strang, founder of the Strangite church and of the town, the name means "Garden of Peace". The community is situated along former Wisconsin Highway 11, just west of the Racine County line. (Full article...)

Cutlerite church headquarters in Independence, Missouri

The Church of Jesus Christ (Cutlerite) is a denomination of the Latter Day Saint movement headquartered in Independence, Missouri, United States. The church derives its epithet from its founder, Alpheus Cutler, a member of the Nauvoo High Council and of Joseph Smith's Council of Fifty. Cutler justified his establishment of an independent church organization by asserting that God had "rejected" Smith's organization—but not his priesthood—following Smith's death, but that Smith had named Cutler to a singular "Quorum of Seven" in anticipation of this event, with a unique prerogative to reorganize the church that no one beyond this group possessed. Hence, Cutler's organization claims to be the only legitimate Latter Day Saint church in the world today. Currently, it has only one branch, located in Independence. The Cutlerite church retains an endowment ceremony believed to date to the Nauvoo period, practices the United Order of Enoch, and accepts baptism for the dead, but not eternal marriage or polygamy. (Full article...)

• Outline of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
• Outline of the Book of Mormon
• Outline of Joseph Smith

The life of Joseph Smith from 1827 to 1830, when he was 22–25 years old, begins in late 1827, after Smith announced he had obtained a book of golden Plates buried in a hill near his home in Manchester, New York (near Palmyra village). Because of opposition by former treasure-seeking colleagues who believed they owned a share of the golden plates, Smith prepared to leave the Palmyra area for his wife's home town of Harmony, Pennsylvania (now Oakland). From late 1827 to the end of 1830, Smith dictated what he stated was a translation of ancient writing on the plates, published the dictation as the Book of Mormon, and established the Church of Christ.

To dictate the Book of Mormon, Smith enlisted the assistance of Martin Harris, a wealthy Palmyra landowner who acted as Smith's scribe. Smith said that he used seer stones (one set of which Smith later called the Urim and Thummim) to translate the plates. Translation ceased, however, when Harris lost 116 manuscript pages of uncopied text. Translation resumed in earnest when Smith was joined in May 1829 by a Smith family associate named Oliver Cowdery. Translation was completed near the end of July 1829, and the resulting manuscript was published as the Book of Mormon on March 26, 1830, in Palmyra. (Full article...)

• ... that The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives star Layla Taylor is no longer a member of the Mormon church?
• ... that James Buchanan helped to open talks over buying Alaska by spreading a rumor that Mormons were planning to emigrate there?
• ... that a Utah TV station was historically preferred by non-Mormon viewers?

• 30 October 1838: The Haun's Mill massacre occurred.
• 9 October 1848: The Nauvoo Temple was destroyed by fire (pictured); only the four exterior walls remained standing.
• 6 October 1890: Wilford Woodruff issues the "1890 Manifesto" halting polygamy.
• 2 October 1976: "To Young Men Only" was delivered by Mormon apostle Boyd K. Packer.
• 10 October 2014: The LDS Church film Meet the Mormons was released in the cinemas of the United States.