As a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I also, like James Huntsman, do not agree with the doctrine of polygamy. In 1828 in Doctrine and Covenants in a revelation by Joseph Smith it says that God’s paths are straight and not crooked and that He never does “vary” from that which He hath said.
In 1830, and still today, in the Book of Mormon God says that the many wives and concubines of David and Solomon were an “abomination” before Him, and that one man should have only one wife, to not repeat the sins of old times.
In 1843 after Joseph Smith’s secret polygamous lifestyle of the last 12 years was exposed in the newspaper “The Expositor” with an advice for him to repent, he ordered the new press to be completely destroyed and then he explained that he once had a revelation where God said that having many wives was now a requirement for the eternities.
So this “abomination” had now become an “eternal law.”
It became an everlasting covenant that all who did not abide by this law would be damned “saith the Lord God,” and all women who would not abide by this law — including Joseph’s wife, Emma — would be destroyed by God himself. On top of this, God contradicts himself by saying that He had given all those many wives and concubines to David and Solomon and others! (Doctrine and Covenants 132)
Sorry, I cannot accept this, and I don’t feel at all the love of Jesus Christ in this. He who died for the sins of all people.
Maria van Lent, Woods Cross