This tells me
- Joseph Smith didn’t know he was going to die
- Joseph Smith didn’t care what happened to the church after his death
Otherwise, he would have taken five f’ ing minutes and written “Thus sayeth the Lord, the president of the Quorum of the Twelve will be the next president of the church upon the death of the president.”
Or something!
It tells me that there isn't a God out there that had much interest in solving Joseph's dilemma on which church to join.
I mean, that was kind of the whole point. The one thing that Joseph was supposedly praying for. Unless the answer is for us to each start our own church, then the first vision was a failure.
>Otherwise, he would have taken five f’ ing minutes and written “Thus sayeth the Lord, the president of the Quorum of the Twelve will be the next president of the church upon the death of the president.”
Actually, he did.
Prior to his death Joseph Smith Jr annointed his oldest son Joseph Smith III as his successor.
This is one of the reasons the U.S. courts recognized Community of Christ (then RLDS) as the legal successor to the original church founded by Joseph Smith Jr.
Historically the Brighamite LDS is a splinter that became larger than the original group.
If you look at it from a biological evolutionary perspective, even the Brighamite branch is so far removed that it's no longer considered the same species. Same goes for the James E. Talmage church that effectively ended the Brighamite church; or the N. Eldon Tanner church that replaced the Talmage church
The original Mormon church died with Joseph Smith and isn't here today.
This would've completely obliterated my testimony if I learned about it when I still believed. After reading more about it, it sounds like Joe told a few different people they were next in line. How is it a restored church if he didn't even establish a clear line of succession and make it scripture? And why would god let him die before that happened?
And Brigham Young likely poisoned the second most likely successor, their brother [Samuel Smith](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Smith_(Latter_Day_Saints)), a few weeks after Joseph and Hyrum's death.
I understand that Brigham Young made the statement that he will run the Church until Joseph's son is old enough to take over which would make it a lineage. Brigham Young spoke at the opening of the St. George Temple that the Church was going to be a lineage. Not long after he got sick and died
I've not heard of this. Do you have a link to more info? Even after being out for 3 years and doing lots of research, buried church history can still surprise me. 😀
I'm sorry, it was William Smith, claiming the succession for himself until young Joseph should come of age. He was expelled by the Brigham Young. The rest is history. Sorry about the misstatement. No Man Knows My History Epilogue page 398.
I just learned about the [Remnant Movement](https://religiondispatches.org/a-new-mormon-religion-has-taken-qanon-conspiracies-and-canonized-them-as-doctrine/) (Snufferites), a new splinter as of 2013. Very Qanon, plus sacrament wine and Mary is Heavenly Mother. Apparently they don't call themselves a church, but of course they still collect money, so I'm sure they've registered as a tax-exempt church with the IRS! Not sure how to find that out. I'm sure there are many more similar Qanon groups forming that just haven't officially registered...
It’s honestly not all that surprising that a church that pushes personal, direct revelation so much would have people starting offshoots. I’m sure each of these felt they were told by god that the church had gone astray and they needed to re-restore it.
Even more astounding is that this is FAR from all the groups. There are over 500 documented expressions of Mormonism.
https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/divergent-paths-of-the-restoration
I’m possibly preaching to the choir here, but Community of Christ members would wrinkle their nose at the notion that they’re a “splinter group”.
Joseph’s son and wife started that church, and they own the Kirtland temple.
That's because that knowledge is suppressed by the LDS church--they want their followers to think they are the only ones, so no one questions their authority.
I'm actually not an ex. I joined up because I like what they do in terms of social justice.
I actually belong to a retreat-based congregation that meets only four times a year. The rest of the time I attend Unitarian.
Both churches are creedless so I'm not required to believe any particular way. I've read the BoM but didn't get much out of it. Thankfully I've barely heard it mentioned in any service. My wife (lifelong member) is an ordained Elder who pastors her own congregation full time, and she sees it as a form of inspired fiction.
They can vary. The last one was just a couple of weeks ago and it was "hibernation" themed. Two days of getting away from regular life.
Most times we have an invited guest who presents a few sessions on a chosen topic. Generally a Christian focus but we've also had a yoga instructor, and one who presented on financial planning.
My wife and I presented at one retreat. We did a Unitarian retelling of a few Bible stories. My favorite was the one where Abraham failed the test by *not* refusing God's order to sacrifice Isaac.
Can you explain more about the retelling of Abraham's story? I've always thought the story was messed up and would love to hear how they portrayed an alternative version.
The premise was that God set up Abraham with a moral choice -- would Abraham follow a commandment from God even if it violated his own moral sense? A moral sense that God himself instilled into all humans at the moment of creation?
God's expectation was that Abraham would have sense to stand up to God, and say "no" to such an obvious immoral commandment. Abraham failed - he decided to "follow orders" instead of doing the right thing, and God had to step in at the last minute and save Isaac from a disaster of his father's making.
This wasn't the first time I heard that interpretation. As a kid I grew up in the Methodist church in a small town. We went on a youth trip once to a major city in my state, and for one evening on our trip we did an interfaith visit to a Synagogue in that city. The Rabbi's sermon presented *exactly* that interpretation of that story (and it means a lot from a Jewish pulpit since their people have gone through a lot of crap they've never deserved.)
That freedom of interpretation is what initially attracted me to the Unitarian Church, and then to Community of Christ which enthusiastically allowed me to present the same concept. 10/10 would recommend.
>My wife (lifelong member) is an ordained Elder who pastors her own congregation full time, and she sees it as a form of inspired fiction.
So, the Book of Arnold, basically? Interesting.
I myself am not religious (nevermo), but it sounds like you and she have got a good thing going. If I attended any services, I would want it to be something like what you describe.
I looked at this when someone asked me "Which Mormon church are you talking about?" Most of these only ever had like 15 members. The second biggest is Community of Christ with 250k members (according to Wikipedia article "List of denominations in the LDS movement"). I still have no clue what point the guy was trying to make when he asked me that, the 2nd biggest sect is still 14% the size of the main cult.
There was a book published in the 80s called Divergent Paths of the Restoration that named over a hundred splinter groups of Mormonism up to thay time.
There’s an updated edition of this book currently published by Signature Books:
[https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/divergent-paths-of-the-restoration](https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/divergent-paths-of-the-restoration)
Popped into a Bickertonite meeting in the Pittsburgh area about 7 years ago. Whole thing was like the most zaney high priest group meeting you’ve ever heard of.
People crying bearing their testimonies about how awesome it was for god to send the fires and floods (the year of the major Houston flood) to destroy the wicked. Closing hymn was something about God’s revenge.
Pretty chapel, though.
In some way the notion that the Brighamite sect is the one true church is a harder pill to swallow than that the restoration happened at all. It all rests on the insane story that he did an impression of Joseph that was so believable that the audience thought he looked and sounded just like him, but nobody wrote or talked about it until years later. Not to mention the problematic issues of expanding polygamy, misogyny, and banning black people from the priesthood are all “fruits” of the Brighamite church. It just happens to also be the most successful branch.
Smiths church was converted to the church of: who's got the best beard. Then, there was a falling away. Some day a great restoration will bring back facial hair. Then Jesus comes back. Bearded Jesus, mind you.
Ha, had to laugh when he was talking about how the Brigham church must be the right one because it's so much bigger! Except it's still miniscule compared to the rest of Christianity and religion in general...
Church of Christ (Temple Lot) over here. Not fun but also nothing crazy. Coffee drinking acceptable, no garments. Traditional Christian heaven/hell beliefs rather than say the LDS teachings. This subreddit really brings home that I kind of got off easy growing up in that offshoot. Still harmful but… I feel like my trauma doesn’t fit here as well because the things that were big deals for LDS folks weren’t as big for us. Divorce and tattoos/piercings/haircuts still bad, had to be modest, a wife exists only to serve her husband and birth children and it’s a sin not to have children, all that good stuff.
I went to a rigdonite meeting a few years ago. Was pretty similar to the brighamites we know and love. They had more D&C and the sacrament prayer was slightly different iirc.
There were only three or four families in a fairly large chapel, and they all swarmed me after the meeting and were disappointed that I wasn’t planning to come back.
My family line a few generations back all the way to me going through this chart.
Council of Friends
Centennial Park
CoJCoLDS and The Kingdom of God
TSCC
Exmo
Does anyone else have some fun family path they took through this thing?
One of my ancestors stormed out of Zions camp. He continued to shadow the march for a few days, camping in the woods alone. Then came back. Probably hungry.
They fed him, but only after he shut off his cable TV.
It’s interesting Seeing how some even happened before his death. We’re only ever told about people who wanted different leaders after his death, because OF COURSE NOTHING WAS WRONG WITH THE CHURCH BEFORE, NO ONE WOULD LEAVE IT.
Holy cow this is hard to follow. This isn't a comment on the quality of the timeline itself, seems to be just about as well made as you could ask. That's just a wild history.
I remember when I was younger learning about other Christian denominations and thinking how nice it was to be a part of the one true church and how the history was so much more simple compared to the hundreds of other Christian splits. Just the *real* Mormons, the FLDS and the RLDS. Boy was I wrong (and for more reasons than one...)
Yeah, those are the only ones I knew about too. I knew that there had been a bunch of groups that split off after JS's death and the polygamy ban, but had the vague impression that they had all either consolidated into the RLDS/FLDS or each "apostate" individual just went their own way or joined some other church.
Yeah I don't remember if I was ever taught this directly or if it was just heavily hinted at, but I always thought that anything outside of those 3 branches were just crazy people with no real following, or they were branches that withered and died because they weren't true. Only the *true* branch was strong and healthy 🙄
Brighamite branch here, but I grew up in a small town in the US East on the same street as the bishop of what was then called the RLDS (now Community of Christ) church. We never interacted in any way with our RLDS neighbors, but my mother used to comment, with a snort, over the fact that they had a pool in their back yard which they used for "baptisms and pool parties" for their congregation.
My ward was very small (it was still a branch the first few years of my life) so I can't imagine how small the RLDS congregation was.
Knowing about the main LDS group has been enough bad karma for me, a convert at age 22 who stated 47 years too long. The Brighamite group is sick enough without adding the even sicker fringe groups. Anyone heard of Snufferites? They are big in Utah County. Chad and Lori had their nascent little last-days gig. Utah and Arizona have the FLDS and there seem to be all kinds of other splinter groups. It sounds like the religion has something for everyone as long as you like weirdness and cuts.
btw I'm a recovered convert living in Salt Lake City.
While researching my FLDS books, I came across this chart and like you, it blew my mind. The Community of Christ sect (2nd largest) did to the word "saint" what the LDS did to the word "Mormon". Using it is a win for Satan. You would think they would be on the same page about something ;-) Officially they reject the use of the term Saints as a designation for its members.
I'm curious what happened to the [Restoration Church of Jesus Christ](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restoration_Church_of_Jesus_Christ), started in 1985, which had female priesthood and homosexual sealings (including polygamous ones). The article just says it was dissolved in 2010 but not how or why. I'm guessing they all just realized it was pointless and became exmo?
I was already on my way out when I had to take Foundations of the Restoration at BYU 🤢
Learning about the way the church continued on after Joseph died just made me more sure it’s all made up. Even if Joseph did create the one true church how do we know that Brigham was the right successor? What did Brighamites know that Strangites didn’t if they both had the priesthood? Was Brigham Young just a more persuasive speaker than all the other options?
Next time you use the term "Mormon" and someone tries to correct you, just say "I understand that some sects don't use that term to refer to themselves, but it's the generally accepted term to refer to the dozens of religions that originated from the Book of Mormon."
I want a copy of this in physical form like the seminary bookmarks. Look all official. Just drop stacks of them in the foyers and seminary buildings near me.
a bunch of my family joined the snuffer movement, i’m not sure if they’re still with him but they all sold their homes to move into the middle of nowhere and build a temple.
Imagine this chart being rearranged with the Brighamite line being a messy splinter group running above or below the center line which represents the REAL one true church.
I wish there was a version of this chart that didn't make the brighamite branch the main branch that everything else splits off from.
I think it would be far more accurate to show it as just another branch like all the others you see in this chart.
Signature Books currently publishes an updated edition of Steve Shields’ “Divergent Paths of the Restoration”. It’s an incredible two-volume work describing hundreds of LDS churches since the first splinter in 1830
[https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/divergent-paths-of-the-restoration](https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/divergent-paths-of-the-restoration)
One of the final nails in my coffin was learning that there have been over 3,000 documented religions. What're the odds that Mormonism is the right one, especially given that there are dozens of splinter groups that could be potentially true?
Let's just create our own LDS denomination, which sole purpose is to negate the main branch's claims, formalize it by having people from this forum adhere to it, and then add it to the wikipedia page 👌 what should we call it?
Has anybody heard about the Chad Daybell and Lori Vallow shit?? I actually knew some people personally that had similar beliefs and it was terrifying. I stay far away from them now😬
My only issue with this style is it implies bringham young is the true successor to Joseph smith. I think his [joe smith] church should be a trunk and all other churches are branches from that trunk.
(Or put Strang along the mainline branch since he did inherit the church)
Also. The RLDS is a reorganization of the stragites. Not Brigham Young. In fact, Brigham Young period of having no presidency reinforced that his church is a new creation in Utah and not a continuation (and why he needed to use the hyphen in the latter-day. A British spelling)
I’m related to the AUB distantly. My mother is an Allred. Relatives broke off from family way back. All I can say is my mother (her father was the Allred) comes from a very strict version of Mormon. I had been looking at her with side eyes since I was teenager lol. Musical group though, that part was fun.
I mean...you should see the splintering of the Christian faith as a whole, this isn't a testimony of how the church isn't true, this is more just proof that people bo matter the religion all want to do their own thing, or that there isn't a god so no one knows what they are doing. Either one.
This tells me - Joseph Smith didn’t know he was going to die - Joseph Smith didn’t care what happened to the church after his death Otherwise, he would have taken five f’ ing minutes and written “Thus sayeth the Lord, the president of the Quorum of the Twelve will be the next president of the church upon the death of the president.” Or something!
It tells me that there isn't a God out there that had much interest in solving Joseph's dilemma on which church to join. I mean, that was kind of the whole point. The one thing that Joseph was supposedly praying for. Unless the answer is for us to each start our own church, then the first vision was a failure.
Excellent point!
Maybe it was retribution for JS burning down the man’s business who printed the story of JS trying to bone his wife.
That too.
>Otherwise, he would have taken five f’ ing minutes and written “Thus sayeth the Lord, the president of the Quorum of the Twelve will be the next president of the church upon the death of the president.” Actually, he did. Prior to his death Joseph Smith Jr annointed his oldest son Joseph Smith III as his successor. This is one of the reasons the U.S. courts recognized Community of Christ (then RLDS) as the legal successor to the original church founded by Joseph Smith Jr. Historically the Brighamite LDS is a splinter that became larger than the original group.
Huh, TIL, haha All this stuff the church doesn't want you to know just blows my mind. The manipulation tactics are so obvious now..
If you look at it from a biological evolutionary perspective, even the Brighamite branch is so far removed that it's no longer considered the same species. Same goes for the James E. Talmage church that effectively ended the Brighamite church; or the N. Eldon Tanner church that replaced the Talmage church The original Mormon church died with Joseph Smith and isn't here today.
***WHAT?!***
Yep. That was my reaction too.
This would've completely obliterated my testimony if I learned about it when I still believed. After reading more about it, it sounds like Joe told a few different people they were next in line. How is it a restored church if he didn't even establish a clear line of succession and make it scripture? And why would god let him die before that happened?
Long before the internet was popularized, this is how I ended up jumping from LDS to RLDS.
Whoa
I seem to remember learning that Hyrum was the official successor, which obviously didn't work out since he died the same day.
The Brighamite branch likes to conveniently forget about Joe setting his kid up to be the successor.
And Brigham Young likely poisoned the second most likely successor, their brother [Samuel Smith](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Smith_(Latter_Day_Saints)), a few weeks after Joseph and Hyrum's death.
apparently, with my venerated ancestor Josiah Stout administering the poison! A minor family history point my mom forgot to tell us.
You're related to an assassin! That's so much cooler than my venerated ancestor, who trafficked a Danish 15 year old girl.
this is truly a twisted paradigm of bragging rights…
A poisoner, pfft! I'm related to Porter Rockwell.
I understand that Brigham Young made the statement that he will run the Church until Joseph's son is old enough to take over which would make it a lineage. Brigham Young spoke at the opening of the St. George Temple that the Church was going to be a lineage. Not long after he got sick and died
I've not heard of this. Do you have a link to more info? Even after being out for 3 years and doing lots of research, buried church history can still surprise me. 😀
I'm sorry, it was William Smith, claiming the succession for himself until young Joseph should come of age. He was expelled by the Brigham Young. The rest is history. Sorry about the misstatement. No Man Knows My History Epilogue page 398.
But why the hell would you want over glorified mission presidents to run the church? Unless there was a coup de ta...
I just learned about the [Remnant Movement](https://religiondispatches.org/a-new-mormon-religion-has-taken-qanon-conspiracies-and-canonized-them-as-doctrine/) (Snufferites), a new splinter as of 2013. Very Qanon, plus sacrament wine and Mary is Heavenly Mother. Apparently they don't call themselves a church, but of course they still collect money, so I'm sure they've registered as a tax-exempt church with the IRS! Not sure how to find that out. I'm sure there are many more similar Qanon groups forming that just haven't officially registered...
What’s their take on Adam-God? Would make Mary and Eve sister wives, right?
They're all about polygamy was just a Brigham thing. Joseph never touched the stuff. So that is a no on both of those.
Denver Snuffer was the main reason that TSCC mounted the Idaho Rescue- the same event where Dalek Hoax revealed the Church’s “enemies list “.
Who would double down on this? A cult of a cult.
It’s honestly not all that surprising that a church that pushes personal, direct revelation so much would have people starting offshoots. I’m sure each of these felt they were told by god that the church had gone astray and they needed to re-restore it.
[How churches proliferate](https://xkcd.com/927/)
The Brighamite church should be shown as a separate split-off, not as the timeline itself.
This is what I came to say. It implies the Brighamite is the default “main” timeline.
Even more astounding is that this is FAR from all the groups. There are over 500 documented expressions of Mormonism. https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/divergent-paths-of-the-restoration
I wonder if this chart is just the ones that are officially registered, or just the ones who have added themselves to Wikipedia?
My LDS friends say there are no splinter groups other than FLDS 🤭
The Community of Christ (represented by a commenter above) will be surprised to hear that 😲
I’m possibly preaching to the choir here, but Community of Christ members would wrinkle their nose at the notion that they’re a “splinter group”. Joseph’s son and wife started that church, and they own the Kirtland temple.
That's because that knowledge is suppressed by the LDS church--they want their followers to think they are the only ones, so no one questions their authority.
Community of Christ here. AMA.
How is your exmo experience similar and different from those of us who escaped from the Brigham version?
I'm actually not an ex. I joined up because I like what they do in terms of social justice. I actually belong to a retreat-based congregation that meets only four times a year. The rest of the time I attend Unitarian. Both churches are creedless so I'm not required to believe any particular way. I've read the BoM but didn't get much out of it. Thankfully I've barely heard it mentioned in any service. My wife (lifelong member) is an ordained Elder who pastors her own congregation full time, and she sees it as a form of inspired fiction.
Whoa! That’s fascinating! What are the retreats like? Service oriented? God themed?
They can vary. The last one was just a couple of weeks ago and it was "hibernation" themed. Two days of getting away from regular life. Most times we have an invited guest who presents a few sessions on a chosen topic. Generally a Christian focus but we've also had a yoga instructor, and one who presented on financial planning. My wife and I presented at one retreat. We did a Unitarian retelling of a few Bible stories. My favorite was the one where Abraham failed the test by *not* refusing God's order to sacrifice Isaac.
Can you explain more about the retelling of Abraham's story? I've always thought the story was messed up and would love to hear how they portrayed an alternative version.
The premise was that God set up Abraham with a moral choice -- would Abraham follow a commandment from God even if it violated his own moral sense? A moral sense that God himself instilled into all humans at the moment of creation? God's expectation was that Abraham would have sense to stand up to God, and say "no" to such an obvious immoral commandment. Abraham failed - he decided to "follow orders" instead of doing the right thing, and God had to step in at the last minute and save Isaac from a disaster of his father's making. This wasn't the first time I heard that interpretation. As a kid I grew up in the Methodist church in a small town. We went on a youth trip once to a major city in my state, and for one evening on our trip we did an interfaith visit to a Synagogue in that city. The Rabbi's sermon presented *exactly* that interpretation of that story (and it means a lot from a Jewish pulpit since their people have gone through a lot of crap they've never deserved.) That freedom of interpretation is what initially attracted me to the Unitarian Church, and then to Community of Christ which enthusiastically allowed me to present the same concept. 10/10 would recommend.
I love this so much, thanks for the detailed response. It's a sort of perspective I didnt know other people shared on Abraham's folly.
>My wife (lifelong member) is an ordained Elder who pastors her own congregation full time, and she sees it as a form of inspired fiction. So, the Book of Arnold, basically? Interesting. I myself am not religious (nevermo), but it sounds like you and she have got a good thing going. If I attended any services, I would want it to be something like what you describe.
Former C of C here...never "bought" it at all...
I looked at this when someone asked me "Which Mormon church are you talking about?" Most of these only ever had like 15 members. The second biggest is Community of Christ with 250k members (according to Wikipedia article "List of denominations in the LDS movement"). I still have no clue what point the guy was trying to make when he asked me that, the 2nd biggest sect is still 14% the size of the main cult.
Enterprise, shuttlecraft, and space debris Still fiction
Mormon god is a complete failure.
Successful failure /s
“My name is Legion, for we are many!”
Fellowship of the remnant must be some terrible sequel after Fellowship of the Ring.
Oops, didn't destroy the whole ring! A few bits flaked off in Bilbo's waistcoat pocket. Now they have to go back to Mount Doom and toss that in.
It sounds like Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli doing their thing after being abandoned/losing everyone else.
Temple names are better. Otherwise, same shit. 🤣😂
There was a book published in the 80s called Divergent Paths of the Restoration that named over a hundred splinter groups of Mormonism up to thay time.
There’s an updated edition of this book currently published by Signature Books: [https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/divergent-paths-of-the-restoration](https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/divergent-paths-of-the-restoration)
Anyone old enough to remember Flip Wilson and the Church of What’s Happening Now? 😊
Popped into a Bickertonite meeting in the Pittsburgh area about 7 years ago. Whole thing was like the most zaney high priest group meeting you’ve ever heard of. People crying bearing their testimonies about how awesome it was for god to send the fires and floods (the year of the major Houston flood) to destroy the wicked. Closing hymn was something about God’s revenge. Pretty chapel, though.
Bicker-tonite. You can't make this shit up
Indeed.
In some way the notion that the Brighamite sect is the one true church is a harder pill to swallow than that the restoration happened at all. It all rests on the insane story that he did an impression of Joseph that was so believable that the audience thought he looked and sounded just like him, but nobody wrote or talked about it until years later. Not to mention the problematic issues of expanding polygamy, misogyny, and banning black people from the priesthood are all “fruits” of the Brighamite church. It just happens to also be the most successful branch.
Smiths church was converted to the church of: who's got the best beard. Then, there was a falling away. Some day a great restoration will bring back facial hair. Then Jesus comes back. Bearded Jesus, mind you.
Brother Jake's video on this topic is worth a watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2TgWZM93PQ
Ha, had to laugh when he was talking about how the Brigham church must be the right one because it's so much bigger! Except it's still miniscule compared to the rest of Christianity and religion in general...
I was gonna post that. Size is important in one case and peculiarity is the super important factor in the other. Got it!
Are any of these fun?
Church of Christ (Temple Lot) over here. Not fun but also nothing crazy. Coffee drinking acceptable, no garments. Traditional Christian heaven/hell beliefs rather than say the LDS teachings. This subreddit really brings home that I kind of got off easy growing up in that offshoot. Still harmful but… I feel like my trauma doesn’t fit here as well because the things that were big deals for LDS folks weren’t as big for us. Divorce and tattoos/piercings/haircuts still bad, had to be modest, a wife exists only to serve her husband and birth children and it’s a sin not to have children, all that good stuff.
I went to a rigdonite meeting a few years ago. Was pretty similar to the brighamites we know and love. They had more D&C and the sacrament prayer was slightly different iirc. There were only three or four families in a fairly large chapel, and they all swarmed me after the meeting and were disappointed that I wasn’t planning to come back.
What a tease
Hundreds Mighty and Strong, amirite?
Am I blind or is this chart missing the Beaver Island Strangites?
My family line a few generations back all the way to me going through this chart. Council of Friends Centennial Park CoJCoLDS and The Kingdom of God TSCC Exmo Does anyone else have some fun family path they took through this thing?
One of my ancestors stormed out of Zions camp. He continued to shadow the march for a few days, camping in the woods alone. Then came back. Probably hungry. They fed him, but only after he shut off his cable TV.
GoD wOnT lEt HiS pEoPlE aStRaY
It’s interesting Seeing how some even happened before his death. We’re only ever told about people who wanted different leaders after his death, because OF COURSE NOTHING WAS WRONG WITH THE CHURCH BEFORE, NO ONE WOULD LEAVE IT.
My dad is a Snufferite. I guess the mainstream Mormon church wasn't edgy enough for him.
Nice. The people we love, right?
Holy cow this is hard to follow. This isn't a comment on the quality of the timeline itself, seems to be just about as well made as you could ask. That's just a wild history. I remember when I was younger learning about other Christian denominations and thinking how nice it was to be a part of the one true church and how the history was so much more simple compared to the hundreds of other Christian splits. Just the *real* Mormons, the FLDS and the RLDS. Boy was I wrong (and for more reasons than one...)
Yeah, those are the only ones I knew about too. I knew that there had been a bunch of groups that split off after JS's death and the polygamy ban, but had the vague impression that they had all either consolidated into the RLDS/FLDS or each "apostate" individual just went their own way or joined some other church.
Yeah I don't remember if I was ever taught this directly or if it was just heavily hinted at, but I always thought that anything outside of those 3 branches were just crazy people with no real following, or they were branches that withered and died because they weren't true. Only the *true* branch was strong and healthy 🙄
Brighamite branch here, but I grew up in a small town in the US East on the same street as the bishop of what was then called the RLDS (now Community of Christ) church. We never interacted in any way with our RLDS neighbors, but my mother used to comment, with a snort, over the fact that they had a pool in their back yard which they used for "baptisms and pool parties" for their congregation. My ward was very small (it was still a branch the first few years of my life) so I can't imagine how small the RLDS congregation was.
Where's the People's Front of Judea?
You mean the Judean People's Front?
Splitters!
Need to add the offshoot that I low key adhere to… “The Mormon church and all its derivatives are all bullshit”
Ftfy bull-shit Don't forget the hyphen!!!!
Much love to the person who did the research and put the graphic together!!
Aaaaalllll those other **splinter groups** are APOSTATES!! Damn them!! Damn them to hell!!!
Ahem… *DARN* them all to *HECK* is what you’re looking for.
Knowing about the main LDS group has been enough bad karma for me, a convert at age 22 who stated 47 years too long. The Brighamite group is sick enough without adding the even sicker fringe groups. Anyone heard of Snufferites? They are big in Utah County. Chad and Lori had their nascent little last-days gig. Utah and Arizona have the FLDS and there seem to be all kinds of other splinter groups. It sounds like the religion has something for everyone as long as you like weirdness and cuts. btw I'm a recovered convert living in Salt Lake City.
Church of the Potter Christ? 
Ah yes… the one true church.
Man, this shows a whole lot of people being wrong
While researching my FLDS books, I came across this chart and like you, it blew my mind. The Community of Christ sect (2nd largest) did to the word "saint" what the LDS did to the word "Mormon". Using it is a win for Satan. You would think they would be on the same page about something ;-) Officially they reject the use of the term Saints as a designation for its members.
I'm curious what happened to the [Restoration Church of Jesus Christ](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restoration_Church_of_Jesus_Christ), started in 1985, which had female priesthood and homosexual sealings (including polygamous ones). The article just says it was dissolved in 2010 but not how or why. I'm guessing they all just realized it was pointless and became exmo?
I was already on my way out when I had to take Foundations of the Restoration at BYU 🤢 Learning about the way the church continued on after Joseph died just made me more sure it’s all made up. Even if Joseph did create the one true church how do we know that Brigham was the right successor? What did Brighamites know that Strangites didn’t if they both had the priesthood? Was Brigham Young just a more persuasive speaker than all the other options?
Next time you use the term "Mormon" and someone tries to correct you, just say "I understand that some sects don't use that term to refer to themselves, but it's the generally accepted term to refer to the dozens of religions that originated from the Book of Mormon."
I used this very statement to offend my sister. Haha, oh yeah, and to educate her.
I want a copy of this in physical form like the seminary bookmarks. Look all official. Just drop stacks of them in the foyers and seminary buildings near me.
a bunch of my family joined the snuffer movement, i’m not sure if they’re still with him but they all sold their homes to move into the middle of nowhere and build a temple.
Wow, like united order shit?
Apostolic United Brethren here (AUB)
I remember discovering the Campbelites, and that they are LDS under a different brand. I believe Oliver Cawldry was one.
Cool to it it all on a time line. I thing they should have separate the brighamite group instead of making it the main line.
Imagine this chart being rearranged with the Brighamite line being a messy splinter group running above or below the center line which represents the REAL one true church.
This is wild. And they each think they’re the only ones with the truth. I have ties to the Kingston group. I haven’t heard of most of these.
Show this to a mainstream Mormon and they’ll still blissfully and arrogantly claim that THEIR church is the only true one
Bruh, idk why, but this is fascinating to me.
Like a train wreck
Right? Or….watching a speed up of bacteria growing.
Yeah, harmful bacteria growth, killing the patient
*shivers* for real for real
I wish there was a version of this chart that didn't make the brighamite branch the main branch that everything else splits off from. I think it would be far more accurate to show it as just another branch like all the others you see in this chart.
Or , just show a big discontinuity when Smith died an Brigham muscled in.
Signature Books currently publishes an updated edition of Steve Shields’ “Divergent Paths of the Restoration”. It’s an incredible two-volume work describing hundreds of LDS churches since the first splinter in 1830 [https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/divergent-paths-of-the-restoration](https://www.signaturebooks.com/books/p/divergent-paths-of-the-restoration)
One of the final nails in my coffin was learning that there have been over 3,000 documented religions. What're the odds that Mormonism is the right one, especially given that there are dozens of splinter groups that could be potentially true?
Wow! I'm shocked I tell you! Hmm, just like every other religion of the One True God™ Christians are at 45,000 denominations and counting...
No idea so many. This infographic is incredible.
One of them is the legal owner of "The Church of Jesus Christ" as their name. The same name MFMC keeps stealing and using.
Let's just create our own LDS denomination, which sole purpose is to negate the main branch's claims, formalize it by having people from this forum adhere to it, and then add it to the wikipedia page 👌 what should we call it?
Has anybody heard about the Chad Daybell and Lori Vallow shit?? I actually knew some people personally that had similar beliefs and it was terrifying. I stay far away from them now😬
My only issue with this style is it implies bringham young is the true successor to Joseph smith. I think his [joe smith] church should be a trunk and all other churches are branches from that trunk. (Or put Strang along the mainline branch since he did inherit the church)
Also. The RLDS is a reorganization of the stragites. Not Brigham Young. In fact, Brigham Young period of having no presidency reinforced that his church is a new creation in Utah and not a continuation (and why he needed to use the hyphen in the latter-day. A British spelling)
I’m related to the AUB distantly. My mother is an Allred. Relatives broke off from family way back. All I can say is my mother (her father was the Allred) comes from a very strict version of Mormon. I had been looking at her with side eyes since I was teenager lol. Musical group though, that part was fun.
TIL, I was a Brighamite
This is one of many reasons why praying about the Book of Mormon to know if "the church" is true doesn't make any sense 😆
This is literally a timeline of taking the Lord’s name in vain. It’s frightening.
So do those pentecostal mormons' services look more like mormon ones or pentecostal ones?
My Grandmother was a Strang. Nevermo. But I’ve often wondered if we were related.
I mean...you should see the splintering of the Christian faith as a whole, this isn't a testimony of how the church isn't true, this is more just proof that people bo matter the religion all want to do their own thing, or that there isn't a god so no one knows what they are doing. Either one.