`Purge' Hits Mormon Church -- Five Top Scholars Ousted In Dispute With Leadership

SALT LAKE CITY - Mormonism's founder, Joseph Smith, once warned that nearly all men, given a little power, will misuse it.

Those words in an 1839 treatise resound today as the church hierarchy moves to quell dissent from a small but vocal segment of the world's 8.5 million Mormons.

In recent weeks, five high-profile scholars and feminists have been excommunicated, and Steve Benson, the grandson of church president Ezra Taft Benson, left the church in a dispute with church leaders.

Church dissidents are pointing to Smith's warning, saying leaders are abusing their ecclesiastical authority by demanding an either-or Old Testament obedience at the expense of the New Testament gospel of love and forgiveness.

"They want the saints to believe they are mild-mannered men that wouldn't harm a fly. But the fact of the matter is, they're not like that. They go after people," said Paul Toscano, a Salt Lake lawyer who was excommunicated, in part for criticizing church leaders.

It is a tenet of Mormon theology that the church is guided by revelation from God to the faith's prophets. Public criticism of church leaders is perceived by most Mormons to be a failure to sustain the leadership and a sure sign of apostasy. It is that principle that is cited by local church leaders in the disciplinary proceedings.

But according to several historians, only in recent decades of the faith's 163-year history have conformity and orthodoxy been so strongly emphasized. The concept of a loyal opposition, alive in the 19th century, has died a slow death in the 20th.

Opinions vary as to why. Allen Roberts, editor of Dialogue, an independent journal of Mormon thought, believes many of the differences between the hierarchy and dissidents are generational.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has never had a president born in the 20th century. Presidents serve for life and the current prophet, Ezra Taft Benson, is an enfeebled 94. Owing to a tradition of apostolic succession, the top 15 church officers average 74 years of age.

The six who were disciplined are in their 40s and possess "a 1960s mentality that believes in free inquiry and debate and civil rights and human rights and progress," Roberts said.

Michael Quinn, considered one of the foremost historians of Mormonism, said one factor in the expulsions is a deep millennialism, a belief that Jesus Christ established the church to pave the way for an apocalyptic return.

"So you have this sense among the rank and file, and it may be true of the leadership too, that there is to be a division and the sheep are going to be separated from the goats," said Quinn, who was excommunicated Sept. 26.

He believes the action was intended as a lesson that mainstream members will take to heart, "That if you don't want this to happen to you, then you'd better not express publicly in any way views which you may suspect might offend the brethren."