Under the Banner of Heaven

A few months ago during a flight to Salt Lake City a fellow flight attendant recommended that I read John Krakauer's "Under the Banner of Heaven." Although I'm against organized religion I somehow love to read about the various religions. Before reading this book I knew nothing about the mormon religion except that plural marriage was once part of the religion.

Reading this book caused me to really think hard about religion and its validity. The book discusses the origins of the mormon religion and the founder Joseph Smith. The book is a perfect depiction of how religion is just a farse. It shows how a power hungry person can take the lead of so many desperate people's lives. The wonderful thing about Joseph Smith (the great con artist) is that there are actual accounts of what his life was like and what kind of person he was. Since he was alive in the 1800's it is easy for us to look back at his life and see what kind of a man he was. We can easily see that he was a liar and used his "messages from god" to get what he wanted. The author points out that the significance of this is that there is no difference between the creation of this religion or any other religion. The only difference is that the mormon religion was created so recently that we can see the truth of the religion whereas the other major world religions were created so long ago that we have no real accounts to help disprove their origin. Have all religions been created out of lies and the desire for power?

There are many "ironic" things in this book. For example, Joseph Smith encouraged his followers to receive their own divine messages from God until some of his followers started getting messages that threatened his power. All of the sudden he received a message from God telling him that from now on God would only send messages to Joseph. Wow! God really does work in mysterious ways :) Then there is the issue of plural marriage. This is not something I'm entirely against if it's done in the right context. However, in my opinion the mormon religion has it all wrong and uses plural marriage as a way to gain control over women. The thing that shocks me the most is that Joseph Smith received a divine message from God that told him plural marriage was one of the most sacred gifts and the best way to honor God. Of course he received this message after coveting many women that were half his wife's age. Coincidence...I think not! More shockingly is that God told him that having multiple wives was holy and that the women's role was to serve their husbands but it was an absolute sin for the women to take a second husband. I mean really! How stupid could these women have been not to see through this BS. Did they really believe that the men of that time received these oppressive messages from God.

Now today most Mormons, especially the ones that are part of the Latter Day Saints, don't practice plural marriage. The people that practice polygamy are usually fundamentalist mormons. Fundamentalist of any kind scare me. They use God as a source of power to promote their own agenda. What really surprised me about the fundamentalist mormons is how many of them are just old dirty bastards looking for a way to continue their desires of pedophilia without feeling guilty about it. They use their religion to justify marrying 14 year old women or molesting their children...in the name of God? After reading many disgusting accounts of these female victims I really started thinking about what could possibly cause someone to desire a child in a sexual way. This is what I came up with: when someone has a real lack of living during a certain time period of their life this creates a desire to relive this part of their life. The appeal of a younger person intesifies because being with that person allows them to be brought back to that mental age. The yearning for perpetual youth is really what the pedophile seeks. There is no true love or divine message that causes these men to take a young bride; there is only a selfish insecurity of a life not lived that compels the pedophile to engage the life of a child.

This book really showed me how people can be easily mislead by religion. Does it matter if religion is promoting peace and equality? Has religion done more harm or good?

All of this leads me to believe that the only true religion is the one you create within your heart. None of us are meant to know who the creator is. All we have to do is what we feel makes the world a better place and helps to deepen our understanding of self.