Item Detail
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24056
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0
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0
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English
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The trials of the Saints : Mormons in New Zealand, 1854-1940
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Building God's Own Country : Historical Essays on Religions in New Zealand
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Dunedin, New Zealand
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University of Otago Press
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139-152
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"New Zealanders have a problem with religion. We like to think of ourselves as reasonable and open-minded people, yet many of us feel uncomfortable discovering that our neighbours are regular churchgoers. For us, religion is a private matter and certainly not something which should be taken door to door or proclaimed on the street corner. This ambivalence towards religion poses a problem for such groups as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, commonly known as the Mormons. Most people recognise the church's elders: young men traveling in pairs, tidily dressed in suits, often with bicycles. These nineteen- and twenty-year-olds have left their homes with the aim of helping others to find their way to spiritual truth, and yet they are mocked, accused of brainwashing, and asked if they are polygamists. What is it about the New Zealand consciousness which leads us to either avoid or attack and ridicule this church and its missionaries?" [p. 139]