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Mormon church mistakenly posts guidelines meant exclusively for local leaders, then removes them

(Chris Detrick | The Salt Lake Tribune) Mormons walk around Temple Square before the afternoon session of the 186th Annual LDS General Conference at the Conference Center in Salt Lake City, Saturday, April 2, 2016.

The LDS Church suffered an oops moment Wednesday.

The faith’s “Handbook 1,” which contains instructions for stake presidents and bishops, became available briefly online.

Previously, only those local lay leaders could access these guidelines.

But, alas, the openness didn’t last. Apparently that content went up by mistake.

“This was a technical error,” church spokesman Eric Hawkins said in a statement Wednesday afternoon, “and has been corrected.”

The link now takes viewers to “Handbook 2: Administering the Church,” which The Church of Jesus Christof Latter-day Saints posted publicly seven years ago for members and nonmembers to read.

This volume covers a wide variety of subjects along with the Utah-based faith’s position on a number of social issues from abortion to birth control, sperm donation to surrogate motherhood.

Of course, in these days of leaks and links, even “Handbook 1” has been surreptitiously available on the internet practically from the day of its release.

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