Item Detail
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13889
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3
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0
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English
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And the Last Shall Be First : The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Former East Germany
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Journal of Church and State
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Summer 2000
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42
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485-505
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For over three decades, members of the Mormon Church were persecuted and harassed more than most other religious believers in the German Democratic Republic. Great efforts were undertaken to infiltrate and spy upon the Church. These efforts are documented in the files of the Stasi. This government espionage uncovered the fact that the Church 'had neither the desire nor the means to be threatening to the regime in any way.' This proved beneficial for the Church when in 1979 policies were reversed to allow the Mormons to build a temple and meetinghouses and to permit missionary work in the country. These concessions were unprecedented among religious groups. The East German government was also looking for a way to gain favor with Western democracies and may have thought that the LDS Church could have been a vehicle to improve their image