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Letter: Don’t ban the Bible. Clean it up, Mormon-style.

(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) The sun rises on the temple of the LDS Church on the first day of General Conference in Salt Lake City on Saturday, Oct. 5, 2019.

I read with a great deal of interest McKay Holland’s letter regarding the removal of the Bible from the book shelves due to the salacious sexual text it has in its pages.

While I agree to a certain extent, I have an idea that might save it from being completely removed from the churches and bookstores.

I have to admit there are some really great stories in the Bible. Things like the Earth is only 7000 years or so old, there is virgin birth, the Ten Commandments were written on stone and held up by Charlton Heston (wait, that was a fictional movie, never mind) and God loves you so much he casts people into eternal burning hell for being bad.

Why not just use the method that the Mormon church has used for years to remove items from its divinely inspired literature that are inconvenient, proven false or just plain stupid. I am of course talking about: revelations, white-out correction fluid or the state Legislature.

A couple of cases in note: (1) Divinely-inspired polygamy was started in 1830 by Joseph Smith and conveniently ended by a divine revelation in 1890 by Wilford Woodruff when Utah wanted to become a state. (2) When the mark of Cain, dark skin, was removed as a reason to not allow Blacks to join the priesthood in 1978. Which was obviously proven to be a false concept because America passed the Equal Rights Amendment passed in 1972. So, what did the church do? They whited it out of their doctrines. (3) Until sometime in 2002 or so Utah allowed the marriage of a 14-year-old girl with parental permission. Oh my heck do you realize how stupid that could look to some of the people coming for the Olympics. So, the inspired Mormon state Legislature amended CR1603 to change it to 16.

I am sure some of your readers can come up with other instances of doctrinal shifting, but my point is why not let the Mormon church have a go at the Bible before banning it.

I am still awaiting a much-needed change in the Mormon belief that being born gay is a sin; not sure if that’s going to be a white-out, convenient revelation or a coming to know it’s just a plain stupid thought.

Roger Strand, Park City

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