The new Mormon history

Professor Klaus J. Hansen has observed that "Mormonism in 1974 differs fundamentally from the Mormonism of 1890 even though no theoretical change in doctrine may have occurred."1 This fundamental difference is obvious to any person who has studied the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with any degree of intensity. Many would attribute the changes the Church has undergone since its organization in 1830 to the influence of contemporary secular forces. The Mormon Church is not the first religion to feel the effects of secularism. The major protestant and Catholic Churches have undergone degrees of secularizing in past centuries. The intellectual enlightenment of the Age of Reason was directly opposed by the Catholic Church, which viewed advances in science and the openness of intellectual inquiry with distrust and suspicion, such things were not only dangerous to faith, but also tended to weaken the authoritarian grip with which the Church compelled obedience from its members.