Hitchens’ Book of Mormon-ism

Excellent Slate article by Christopher Hitchens on Mormonism, its core beliefs, and how it should be discussed in the context of the presidential campaign. Hitch’s piece includes a reference to a terrific book I republished in 1995, by Facebook friend Alex Shoumatoff. It’s his superb study of human kinship and genealogy, The Mountain of Names. It arises here b/c of the Mormon practice, indulged in for many years, of posthumously claiming souls to harvest for supposed salvation, even non-Mormon decedents, such as murdered Holocaust victims. The book’s title is a direct reference to the name bank that Mormons, at least until the mid-90s, kept in the rocky innards of a private peak in Utah. In his inimitable way, Hitch tartly dubs this “a crass attempt at mass identity theft from the deceased.”

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