The raid by Texas Child Protection Services on a polygamous sect compound has triggered a wave of publicity that has extended from the United States to many other parts of the world. Along with the public revulsion for what journalists are reporting could be widespread and systemic child abuse, a less significant but still interesting factor has emerged. Reporters seem to be taking more care in separating the term "Mormon" from polygamous groups.

Reuters religion writer Ed Stoddard summed it up well on his blog earlier this week.

On behalf of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I followed with my own video comments.

The term Mormons can never, ever be used to describe polygamist sects.

For me, there is no more electric moment in the New Testament than the encounter between the risen Jesus and Mary Magdalene. Mary’s soul must have been struck with utter shock and dismay when she sorrowfully came to the tomb where Jesus lay early that Sunday morning to dress the body only to find the sepulcher empty. Yet moments later she was in an ecstasy of joy when she became the first human to ever see a resurrected being, her own beloved Master.

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De Tocqueville called it “restive curiosity” – that peculiarly American trait of always seeking for something different, something better.

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We believe that all religious societies have a right to deal with their members for disorderly conduct, according to the rules and regulations of such societies; provided that such dealings be for fellowship and good standing; but we do not believe that any religious society has authority to try men on the right of property or life, to take from them this world's goods, or to put them in jeopardy of either life or limb, or to inflict any physical punishment upon them. They can only excommunicate them from their society, and withdraw from them their fellowship.

"We believe that men should appeal to the civil law for redress of all wrongs and grievances, where personal abuse is inflicted or the right of property or character infringed, where such laws exist as will protect the same..."

-- From a declaration of belief regarding governments and laws in general, adopted by unanimous vote at a general assembly of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints at Kirtland, Ohio, August 17, 1835.

This hierarchy of seven deadly sins grew out of the monastic orders of the Middle Ages in Europe, so even though each of these sins is present in ancient Judeo-Christian texts, the list isn’t a biblical concept.

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No people in history have been as successful as the Jews in retaining their roots while embracing change in an environment of hostility.

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I grew up in a large port city, with more than its share of the social problems common to most big cities. I have a snatch of memory of a young woman in Salvation Army uniform, wrapped against the cold of an English winter, moving quietly in the dark evening through the pubs and taverns of the dockland to seek out the working men who would dig in their pockets for loose change. I seem to remember that she did somewhat better when asking for donations from the slightly inebriated.

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It seems self-evident that any Christian worthy of the name ought to embrace Jesus's teachings. His references to being the "Resurrection and the Life," His specific teachings on the topic, His literal resurrection and demonstration of His physical reality, the resurrection of others and the teachings of the apostles all make life after death an integral part of the faith.

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The apostle Paul wrote that faith in Jesus Christ was “unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness” (1 Cor.1:23). It seems nothing much has changed in 2,000 years except the choice of words.

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The word “cult” in common usage is almost always a pejorative and, in my experience, usually used by someone with an agenda.

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"I am not complaining,” my father wrote to my mother from war-ravaged Europe during the closing days of World War 2, when he finally reached the safety of American lines after three years as a POW. “I would not appreciate comfort if there were no hardship. We cannot appreciate joy without sorrow, health if we have never felt pain, or peace until after a war. All things must have their opposites, and we can learn from both."

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This is the kind of question that could be asked once a month and we’d never run out of things to say. It also calls for a very personal answer.

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I try to make it a habit not to pick fights with people of other faiths, and it’s not because I don’t disagree with them. Even when I read the Pope’s reassertion last week of the universal primacy of the Roman Catholic Church, including the statement that other churches are not actually churches “in the proper sense” but communities, I saw no compelling reason to change my habit.

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Most people of faith agree that life goes on in some form after what we call death. For many Christians, belief in the immortality of the soul and a literal resurrection are central tenets. But while the Bible mentions “heaven” frequently, it isn’t much help with the specifics.

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There are two discernible questions here, so let’s take them in sequence.

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Faith and works have always been natural companions, and to try to draw a precise dividing line between the two is an exercise in futility.

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In my early days as a reporter, I saw terrible poverty. I remember sitting in a dark, mildewed cellar that was home to immigrant parents with several children, the rain pouring through the ceiling and a rat running across the floor. I listened in disbelief as the distraught father told me how much rent he was paying his landlord.

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From the beginning of their history, Christians were outsiders.

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A couple of years ago there was a knock at the door of my home one Saturday morning and I was greeted by an acquaintance, who asked for a few minutes. Invited inside, he proceeded to explain with some embarrassment how he had done something anonymously that was deliberately intended to hurt my reputation.

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Mischaracterizations, errors and distortions are common enough in mass media’s treatment of religion, whether in news or entertainment.

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