“Mormon” is Back (and no wonder)

Its a no brainer really. In the Internet world no one goes looking for “The Church of yada, yada, yada yada.” So, if Mormons go on styling themselves “The Church of yada, yada, yada yada” they will simply disappear from the ether – no bad thing in my view. But we don’t get rid of them that easily.

What I want to know is what are they going to find to whine and lecture us about now that they can no longer legitimately insist, “Mormon is a nickname actually, used by ENEMIES OF THE CHURCH; Grrrrr! The full name of the church is “The Church of yada, yada, yada yada. Please respect my religion by showing some subservience and deferring to everything I tell you. We control the vertical. We control the horizontal.”

After a decadelong moratorium, Mormon is back. The name, that is.

It will be on display everywhere this weekend as thousands gather for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' 180th Annual General Conference in Salt Lake City.

Where LDS leaders once were pushing members to call themselves Latter-day Saints, rather than Mormons, now the church-owned Deseret News has created the Mormon Times. "Mormon Messages" is on YouTube. The "Mormon Channel" is on the radio. And the faith's missionary Web site is mormon.org.

So what has changed for the nearly 14 million-member church? The Internet.

Last year, some 26.8. million people searched for the word "Mormon," 5.3 million hunted for "Mormons," and 1.3 million scouted for "Mormonism," noted Michael Otterson, managing director of LDS Public Affairs.

Although about 32 million searched for "LDS," church officials believe most of those were members. Few search for the official name.

"It's simply a reality that people think of Mormons, they don't think of Latter-day Saints," Otterson said Thursday. "Mormon is here to stay."

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