The Sects That Rejected 19th-Century Sex

Why Three Religious Groups Traded Monogamy for Celibacy, Polygamy, and Complex Marriage

Disconsolate after his beloved’s marriage to another man in 1837, a young seminarian named John Humphrey Noyes declared in a bitter, anti-love poem to his ex:

I will not give you back your heart,
I’ve wooed and fairly won it,
And sooner with my life I’ll part,
You may depend upon it.

Not content with mere verse, Noyes would go on to turn his emotional anguish into a theological critique of the institution of monogamous marriage itself (or as he once called it, “Egotism for Two”). Condemning monogamy as “simple” and replacing …

Why Samoans Are So Overrepresented in the NFL

It All Started in Hawaiʻi on Oahu’s North Shore, Where Plantation Managers and Mormon Elders Nurtured Generations of Football Stars

Long before Oahu’s North Shore became a global hot spot for football, it was a pu`uhonua, a refuge under the protection of priests. Fugitives and villagers escaping the carnage of …

Searching for Utopia in Illinois

A Massive Limestone Carving From a 19th-Century Mormon Temple Reminds Us of Americans’ Many Quests to Forge New Communities

Twelve massive blocks of limestone, each carved with a shining sun and heralding trumpets, once ornamented a temple constructed by the Church of the Latter Day Saints in the town …

Why My Mormon Mom Joined the Cannabis Lobby

Living With a Sibling With Epilepsy Has Meant Embracing a New Normal for Our Whole Family. The Fight to Legalize a New Drug in Utah Was No Exception.

My 19-year-old sister is adorable. She’s fiercely independent, a little moody, and obsessed with movies. She’s also the reason my mother joined forces with other Utah moms to form a …

How Mormons Feel Today: Exhausted, Frankly

Mitt Romney’s Run, Win or Lose, Was Supposed to Make My Religion Unremarkable. Instead, Mormonism Took a Beating.

Now that the votes have been counted, how should Mormons feel about the consummation of the Romney era? To be frank, the emotion many Mormons—and certainly this one—feel is exhaustion. …

The Elephant in the Race

Romney Should Address What His Faith Means For the Rest of Us

Earlier this year, when Mitt Romney ventured that he relies on his wife, Ann, to tell him what American women are thinking, many of those women no doubt rolled their …