Talk:The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Restoration?

I've seen a few edits recently about this line:

"...is a Christian restorationist church that considers itself to be the restoration of the church founded by Jesus Christ."

The disagreement seems to be whether "the restoration" is NPOV. Not according to the LDS church. It's the very foundation of their religion. In their scriptures (Pearl Of Great Price, Joseph Smith History 1, verses 18 and 19), it states the following (italics mine):

"18 My object in going to inquire of the Lord was to know which of all the sects was right, that I might know which to join. No sooner, therefore, did I get possession of myself, so as to be able to speak, than I asked the Personages who stood above me in the light, which of all the sects was right (for at this time it had never entered into my heart that all were wrong)—and which I should join.

19 I was answered that I must join none of them, for they were all wrong; and the Personage who addressed me said that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight; that those professors were all corrupt; that: “they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.”

Smith claimed to have restored the pure Church of Jesus Christ. While it would be NPOV to say that the LDS church IS the restoration, I don't believe it's NPOV to say the church CONSIDERS it to be the restoration.

Thoughts? --Manway 16:38, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps you meant: "While it would be POV to say that the LDS church IS the restoration, I don't believe it's POV to say the church CONSIDERS it to be the restoration."? -- 208.81.184.4 (talk) 18:42, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

EXACTLY what I meant. Thank you. In the words of Steve Martin, "Some people have a way with words. Other people...well...uh...don't have...way, you know?" Appreciate the clarification. Regards, --Manway 19:11, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

With that clarification, I agree with you. -- 208.81.184.4 (talk) 16:59, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

I am a Mormon and Joseph Smith did restore the Church, and the reason why is that the world was not being true to the commandments. Dance3600 (talk) 05:12, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

This comment is directed to the editor above and is for informational purposes only. I am also LDS (remember to use correct terminology as requested by Church leaders) and I also know that Joseph Smith restored the Church that existed in Christ's day. But for Wikipedia purposes, we can only say that our Church "considers itself to be a restoration of Christ's original Church" because to do otherwise violates Wikipedia policies about having a neutral point of view. So that's why the current wording exists in this article this way. Hope that helps you. --Jgstokes (talk) 05:43, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Differences between LDS and Christians need to include the central issue, very different beliefs about God and the Trinity

Hi I visited another wiki article written from a LDS POV and noticed it misleadingly grouped Mormons with "other Christian groups" and visited this article to find that at the end of the section on "Controversy and Criticism" the central reason why Christians do not regard Mormons as Christian is not mentioned. It is basic common sense to point out in the Controversy and Criticism section the Mormon belief in a trinity of three divine beings (and in the words of this article in another section there is also a belief that Mormons may "become divine beings or 'gods' themselves") decidedly differs from the foundational Christian belief in only one God in three divine persons. Here is what the article currently says: "Many have accused the LDS Church of not being a Christian church at all as a result of disagreements with Apostolic succession and the "Great Apostasy", the Nicene Creed and, more so, Mormon cosmology and its plan of salvation including the doctrines of pre-mortal life, baptism for the dead, three degrees of heaven, and exaltation." Something about the differences between Mormons and Christians about whether there are multiple divine beings or only one God necessarily belongs in this article. There is a Wikipiedia article on Mormon beliefs about God which might be helpful for an editor to ensure this most significant point of controversy is touched on. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_in_Mormonism Elizdelphi (talk) 00:08, 19 May 2014 (UTC)

If you did your research a little better, you would discover that the requested wording does indeed exist in other articles relating to the LDS Church, including all the details you proposed for this article. You can find them relatively easily. Happy reading! --Jgstokes (talk) 00:18, 19 May 2014 (UTC)

Footnote ordering

Why are the footnotes disordered and non-continuous, and does anyone know how to fix this? For example, footnote 6 at the bottom is linked with superscript 9 in the text, and some footnote numbers (such as 6) don't appear in the text at all. Some of the early numbers appear in the box to the right, but even those aren't in order right now (2, 3, 1 in one location), and those in the box don't account for all that are missing from the text. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 153.31.113.27 (talk • contribs)

Requested move

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints → Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints – There was a recent dust-up over whether to include (and capitalize) the word "The" in references to this church. In this context, I felt it would be helpful to have a discussion about the article name and how the guideline WP:THE might apply to it. I want to be neutral as to the result of this discussion, but I do want the discussion to take place.

There are some preliminary points which I believe are relatively uncontroversial: (1) the official name of the church includes the capitalized "The", and for the past few decades materials that the church publishes consistently includes and capitalizes the "The", even in running text; (2) the inclusion of the capitalized "The" as part of the church's name has theological significance to the church's adherents: see this article; (3) a special Manual of Style has been developed to address some of these issues; the appropriateness of the existence of this MOS has been questioned; (4) this church claims to be the same institution as the original Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, but there are also a lot of other churches that claim the same thing; (5) there are a bunch of other churches, past and present, with very similar names, but this one is by far the largest and most prominent of the lot: see here; and (6) almost all non-LDS sources, on a consistent basis, when referring to the church, do not capitalize the "the" in running text. Relisted. Jenks24 (talk) 08:07, 8 July 2014 (UTC) Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 00:10, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

• Comment As an advocate of using The Bronx as our article title, I have little objection to the article here being called The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as long as there is a redirect from Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, which I assume there is, but, just as with the Bronx, appearances of the church name within a sentence should be kept at the grammatically correct "the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints". In other words, I object strongly to the use of a capitalized "The" in the middle of sentences. Therefore, I would normally (very weakly) oppose this requested move. However, I don't believe the name of the article is really all that important, as compared to the mid-sentence usage, and I do not want the current name of the article to be taken as a indication to POV editors that the capitalized "The" is acceptable under all circumstances, therefore, I'm going to stay neutral on the question of the move, unless I see arguments here which are persuasive enough to convince me to take a specific stand. BMK (talk) 00:30, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

  In addition, I am one of those who believe the specialized MOS section made specifically to deal with Mormon-related style matters should be abolished, since it is dominated by adherents of that religion, who do not approach these issues with the best interests of the encyclopedia in mind, instead approaching it with what the church wants as being paramount. BMK (talk) 00:34, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

I actually think you'd find the MOS section is largely different than characterized. Though I had no involvement with its development, the guidelines were put together in good faith by experienced editors to do just the opposite - to help avoid POV users who would want to declare what the church or its doctrines might say, in an effort to have it be more encyclopedic in nature. Those who have actively participated in editing articles about the church, or any related issues, continue to try to be balanced, measured and fair, focusing on fact or sourced materials, rather than what the church might view as paramount. There is certainly the occasional person who wants to insert their belief or "testimony" into articles, but that goes away quickly and easily, often backed by what's in the MOS guidelines.ChristensenMJ (talk) 05:27, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

I agree largely with what ChristensenMJ has said on the style guide issue. If read, users will find that it clearly does not adopt what the LDS Church wants as being the paramount concern. For instance, the LDS Church wants and prefers people to use the short form "the Church of Jesus Christ" when referring to it, but this short form was unanimously rejected by editors who put together the MOS because of its ambiguity and lack of use by any reliable sources. It was put together by users with connections to a variety of churches in the Latter Day Saint movement (many of which are vehemently opposed to each other) and some with no connection at all. The writing of its guidelines certainly wasn't dominated by users who are members of the LDS Church. As a participant in editing it over the years, I see no evidence that those who have participated in editing it "do not approach these issues with the best interests of the encyclopedia in mind". I would like to see some support for such claims if they are made. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 09:43, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

• Support – I don't object to this name change. There is no reason why "The" has to be included in the article title when in most outside sources the "the" is not capitalized. If we do change it, however, we need to also change The Church of Jesus Christ (Bickertonite) as well. Ltwin (talk) 01:36, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

Well yes, there are reasons such as MOS and not just the project style guide. It is an official name and we shouldn't be dropping words. Is there some part of MOS that you interpret as overriding the official name of an organization?--Mark Miller (talk) 02:48, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

"The Episcopal Church" is the official name of the US-based Episcopal Church, but Wikipedia entitles it's page Episcopal Church (United States). "The" is dropped because although "official" it usually would not "be capitalized in running text" (see WP:THE). I don't see why the LDS Church's page should be any different. Ltwin (talk) 08:25, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose I didn't support the use of the capitalization in every use because I am against setting hard fast rules and see such as "Instruction creep". If the institutions official name is "The Church of Jesus Crist of Latter Day Saints" then the article title should reflect that and ignore any other rule about common name or common usage. We are not here to "right great wrongs" just write a factual and accurate encyclopedia and to me, messing with the spelling of official names of people, places and institutions is not just insensitive but original research at the very least. I don't see an MOS going so far as to tell editors they must capitalize with every use because that limits what cannot be expected our guidelines are purposely written to be vague enough to not be instruction but guidance. Changing the article name makes not sense.--Mark Miller (talk) 02:27, 30 June 2014 (UTC)
• Support – evidence in books suggest that the "The" is not a part of the proper name, or is not considered so by most book editors. Dicklyon (talk) 02:36, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm not a member of the church, but I believe naming conventions for Wikipedia suggest disregarding the number of times a name or spelling is used in sources for the most accurate. The MOS states: "Do not ordinarily capitalize the definite article after the first word of a sentence; however, official names (for example, names of corporations and other entities) and some idiomatic expressions, including the titles of artistic works, should be quoted exactly according to common usage."--Mark Miller (talk) 02:44, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

Yes, common usage, but not necessarily the official name. As pointed out elsewhere, some institutions, such as "The Ohio State University" rather obnoxiously insist on the "The", (aside: you'll see this on the TV in the player introductions for NFL games, where all players who graduated from Ohio State are very careful to say "The Ohio State University", to the point of emphasizing "The") but we ignore that, because "Ohio State University" is the WP:COMMONNAME of the school. Unfortunately, with LDS, I think most people don't know the official name of the church, with or without "The", and think of it as something along the lines of the "Mormon Church". BMK (talk) 03:09, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

I understand that we ignore that many times. I don't understand what part of the MOS supports that. I do see that the MOS suggests that we use whatever is the official name and spelling but then ends the above description with "..in common usage". I am in the process of researching this for another part of the MOS over official names and what is best practice regionally to ascribe a particular orthography. In most cases, when referring to something of a regional culture, we use the regional orthography regardless of other, prominent common usage in sources. There seems to be some conflicting information in the MOS for religion however, as it suggests that "The" be dropped in church names. Lacking a more specific guideline the project style guide can at least show what the consensus of that part of the encyclopedia is. We shouldn't disregard that simply because there are some unruly editors that may insist on adhering to a more precise interpretation of many subjects that even touch on the LDS church. In fact...another part of our MOS suggests that this be reduced to CJCLDS, or even JCLDS. Consensus will determine this, but I hope editors take some time to look into the different ways the MOS addresses the treatment and style given to these specific church titles in the various parts of the MOS that touch on it. As BMK points out, many don't even know what the name of the church is because "Mormon Church" is the most common. So we already know common name is not being used here.--Mark Miller (talk) 03:31, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting that we follow sources in general, but the MOS eschews unnecessary embellishments including caps; the usage makes it clear that including "The" as part of the proper name of the church is an unnecessary embellishment. Dicklyon (talk) 03:37, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

I see what you are saying. But are they embellishments or just an official part of the spelling of the name? It is a pretty long name but, if anywhere, the title should be the most precise and whatever actual embellishments such as macrons and diacritics should be respected for some titles whenever it is the regional or proper name. Here we are not even talking about a special character but the exclusion of part of the name that I am not sure is supported by our MOS.--Mark Miller (talk) 03:51, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose As pointed out in the initial thoughts starting this discussion, "The" is part of the church's official name. It is supported by guidelines (WP:THE) for use as part of the official name. As to mid-sentence use, generally most articles use the full name of the church in the first instance, with a short name (typically "LDS Church") then established and used going forward. It would be appropriate to use the full name of the church in that first usage instance, including use of "The". The Google search data doesn't have the ability to represent what is part of the proper name or not, that's not relevant. This is very different to other examples, such as Ohio State University and other similar usages. I agree with editors making that particular point.ChristensenMJ (talk) 05:39, 30 June 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose That is the official corporate name of the organization. The Corporation Of The President Of The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter Day Saints. It's pretty clear that's what they want to be called. See [1]. --Manway 17:55, 30 June 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose It is just too easy to teach and inform rather than misinform. The actual, correct name is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It is not Church of Jesus Christ...; it is not Church of Latter-day Saints, which I see most often by those who are not members refer to the Church. --^StormRider 00:19, 1 July 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose Per LDS version of the Doctrine and Covenants 115:4, "The" is a vital and essential part of the Church's official name. I would be unalterably opposed additionally to any omission of the first capitalized "The" because I fully concur with the arguments opposing this move and add my voice to their viewpoints. --Jgstokes (talk) 06:27, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

  Not to be too obvious, but Wikipedia is not subject to the "Doctrines and Convenants" of the LDS Church. If we should decide, by consensus of the editors participating, that the article should be located at "Mormon Church", that's where it would be located, regardless of what the LDS Church says about it. That being so, I suggest you and other oppose votes cite some Wikipedia policies, or at the very least editing guidelines, to support your views, since "Because the LDS says so, that's why" carries very little weight in a mutli-cultural, multi-religious project such as this. BMK (talk) 06:59, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

  It's getting a little stuffy in here, so I thought we might open up the discussion a bit. I've left neutral pointers to this thread at WikiProject Religion, WikiProject Guid of Copy Editors, and WikiProject Grammar. BMK (talk) 07:22, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

• Comment. I'm not sure that all users have globbed on to the idea of this nomination. Some users have simply stated that we should use the "The" because it's included in the official name of the church. Well—as I said in the lead, it's uncontroversial that this is part of the official name, but I was hoping to see discussion on applying the guidelines, including WP:THE and WP:COMMONNAME (and the related considerations of WP:OFFICIALNAME), to this situation. I don't really have a preference as to outcome, but I'd like to see better arguments presented in favor of the current name than just "we have to use the official name". (Not every argument above has been similarly lacking, though.) Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 09:35, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

  Good comment. OPPOSE 1. Why try to fix what is not broken? 2. The name is the name, (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; and 'the LDS church' or 'the Mormon church') 3. Why offend many of the readers who come here who are members of the LDS Church? 4. Others who are not members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are not even going to notice the difference, only top WP editors. -- Charles Edwin Shipp (talk) 12:30, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

  So, does that mean you think we should only stick to proper grammatical usage when the hoi polloi are going to notice if we don't, that it's OK to use bad grammar -- such as capitalizing "The" in the middle of a sentence -- if no one notices? And if we're going to avoid "offending" LDS members (and if they are offended by a grammatical nuance such as this, they must have pretty thin skins), are we going to avoiding "offending" the members of all other organized religions in the world, and allow them to dictate to us exactly how we cite their name, the titles of their clergy, the sacred names of their rituals, etc? Will we never again refer to "Last Rites" because Catholics call it, technically, "Extreme Unction"? If not, why does the LDS get this special treatment? BMK (talk) 21:53, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

• Comment The Salt Lake Tribune, which prides itself on being independent from (and a secular counterweight to) the LDS church, appears to capitalize "The" in the full name of the church when used mid-sentence. See, e.g., [2]: "Before the missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints returned, ...." But the New York Times, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times all keep "The" lowercase mid-sentence. In terms of common usage, the full name nearly always appears with "the" (whether upper or lowercase) at the front, with rare exceptions. (One recent such exception is in a recent book review in the Los Angeles Times, wherein the reviewer writes "the fledgling Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints".) On balance, I believe common usage and the institution's own name for itself both support retaining "The" as part of the article title; but I feel that despite the Salt Lake Tribune style, the mid-sentence "The" should be lower case, following the practice of the larger newspapers. I also observe that it's The Salt Lake Tribune, The New York Times, The Washington Post—but Los Angeles Times. alanyst 23:25, 1 July 2014 (UTC)
• Support. Part of the official name or not, the definite article does not appear to be commonly capitalised in running text. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:10, 2 July 2014 (UTC)
• Relisting comment. Obviously an issue that is very important to some people so I'm giving this another week primarily so that those who are opposed to the move have the opportunity to make a better case. If I closed the RM at this moment the consensus would be to move it. Jenks24 (talk) 08:07, 8 July 2014 (UTC)
  • Ah, no., just no. An impartial admin does not relist a move in order to allow one side to make more comments. Relisting is only appropriate when there has not been enough participation, regardless of the "side" the participants are on. So, you either close this according to your perception of where the !vote is at this very moment, or I will bring your comment to WP:AN/I, and we'll see what happens then. BMK (talk) 08:18, 8 July 2014 (UTC)
    • As I said on your talk page, you've got 24 hours to reconsider your action, before I bring this to AN/I. BMK (talk) 08:30, 8 July 2014 (UTC)
      • Of course those in support can also make further comments, I just thought I would make it clear that if this gets into the RM backlog again without the arguments having changed markedly I will close it as moved. I probably could have worded it better, but I stand by the sentiment. And relisting can be done for a multitude of reasons, not simply because there hasn't been enough participation. Note also that a relist does not prohibit another admin (or even myself I guess) from closing it for another seven days, it can still be closed at any time. Take it to ANI if you wish, I doubt I will be desysopped as you suggested on my talk page. Jenks24 (talk) 08:32, 8 July 2014 (UTC)
        • If that's the way you want it, I won't wait the 24 hours, then. BMK (talk) 08:34, 8 July 2014 (UTC)
        • Since you have already announced your intentions and bias here, I would strongly suggest you recuse yourself from any administrative action and instead request an uninvolved 3rd party to step in here to review this discussion. Extending any discussion before action is IMHO reasonable, but don't overdo that either. --Robert Horning (talk) 14:28, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose. As pointed out by Mark Miller, "The" is an essential part of the official name of the organization. If the common name argument was to be applied here, then the article should be renamed to "LDS Church" or "Mormon Church"; neither of which are improvements. I honestly don't understand how Mark's position was not considered the best argument in this RM.--MarshalN20 ^Talk 11:38, 8 July 2014 (UTC)
• Support as per WP:THE. This is not a special enough case to merit an exception. Red Slash 07:05, 15 July 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose per the reasoning of Mark Miller. From my reading of WP:THE, the guideline does allow for a preceding "The" in some cases when the page name is the official name of a group, as is the case here. This would be inline with external style guidelines like the US Government Printing Office Style Manual which states (in 3.11) that "the word the (or its equivalent in a foreign language) is capitalized when used as a part of an official name or title." --FyzixFighter (talk) 01:56, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose Following an implied standard when it is shown to have valid-reason exceptions, should not override to offend members of the LDS Church. A guideline of Wikipedia is to use common sense. -- Charles Edwin Shipp (talk) 05:31, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose The official name of the Church includes the article and does merit an exception so far as any guideline that tries to generally remove grammatical articles from Wikipedia article titles. Regardless, it is a tempest in a teapot and something I don't think anybody should object about other than to not engage in edit wars or wheel warring over this topic. --Robert Horning (talk) 14:28, 16 July 2014 (UTC)
  • • I agree with you, but there has to be some compelling reason why it should be changed. Wiki goes out of its way not to be legalistic; yet I still have not read any reason why it should change. The rules, which are recommendation not commands, allow for bands or musical publications to use the definite article, if it is on their official website, for proper names (it actually uses this article as an example of such), official titles of literary works (official titles seems to be a respected rule on Wiki), it is even used for corporations when it is their official title. Exactly how is all of this to be overlooked and for what purpose; what is being gained? --^StormRider 07:28, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose. Keep the status quo, keep the "The", and capitalise in running text. I see it coming down to the nominator's point (2) versus (6). I think (2) wins, because to not capitalise the "The" amounts to using an "incorrect" name, and if it is capitalised in running text, it needs to be in the title. Looking at WP:The, this case is similar to "The New York Times" and "The Crown".

(6) would normally trump (1), except where (6) is "incorrect" usage, and "incorrect" demands further investigation, which (2) provides.

(3) The MOS should be able to cope with this. The MOSers as a group are a little too inflexible with their rules they try to enforce; if the rules can't cope with proper names beginning with "The", then the rules need modification.

I haven't made much of (4) or (5). --SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:20, 17 July 2014 (UTC)