New Mormon.org: Transparency dispels myths about Mormons

by Emily Robbins

In a world where the isolation of the Internet has replaced the lively town square as the go-to source for information, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is trying to use communication and friendship to make their voice heard.

The Church launched the latest version of Mormon.org Wednesday night, with a new focus on individual members’ experiences and beliefs, and an attempt at using conversational language to dispel rumors and myths about Mormonism.

“It’s all about transparency,” said Ron Wilson, Manager of Internet and Marketing at the Church Missionary Department. “Our members are out talking everyday to their friends and they’re saying it how they say it and they explain things the way that they think. We really felt like this [Web site] should not be a cultural voice from an institution.”

Throughout the history of Mormonism, there has been a pervasive misconception that it is a religion for conservative white males, but Church membership statistics simply do not support that idea.

Mormon.org 4.0 is an effort by the Church to show the world that members of the Church don’t fit into a single “Mormon” mold.

“This really is about portraying the face of the Church, because the Church is a collective of individuals, and we all have our own challenges and our own life to live, but we’re bound by the gospel of Jesus Christ as a common belief,” Wilson said.

Mormon.org is the culmination of years of research and efforts to make the site most effective.

It needed to be an accurate representation of the face of the Church; a place where members talk candidly about their beliefs, where transparency prevails, and a curious web-browser can learn about Mormonism by getting to know members of the church in a casual way, much like having a virtual Mormon friend.

During the brainstorming process of this project, Wilson and the other developers had several “ah ha” moments, one of which was that people who have Mormon friends or family, or who have come in contact with someone who is Mormon, are far less likely to have misconceptions about the faith.

“If they don’t know Mormons they believe things like, Mormons practice polygamy, and they’re racist and they’re sexist, and some of these other things that if they know a Mormon, they know that’s not correct," Wilson said.

This Web site is a tool for sharing personal beliefs and faith, in a conversational environment.

Every member of the Mormon Church has at one time or another felt the pressure of the phrase “every member a missionary.”

The nature of the new Mormon.org offers a way for members across the globe to guiltlessly lift the weight of this axiom from their shoulders.

Members who don’t have many missionary opportunities, who are uncomfortable, nervous or afraid of the questions they might be asked, now have a way to share their testimonies with the world.

“This is a really safe way for your voice to be heard and be added to the conversation,” Wilson said. “You can create a profile on Mormon.org, put the reasons out there why you’re a member of the Church and you’re doing missionary work.”

While members are creating their profiles, they can choose from a list of frequently asked questions by people of other faiths. This gives members an opportunity to address these issues, from polygamy to whether or not Mormons worship Joseph Smith, along with many other common questions.

“We’ve got people who’ve talked about Prop 8, abortion, same gender attraction issues, profiles of members who are facing those challenges in their life; it really does run the gamut,” Wilson said. “You can imagine that if it’s been talked about or discussed it’s probably on the site.”

Some early critics of the site have voiced concern that censorship of member’s profiles might be heavy-handed, but Brother Wilson is clear that blanket censorship would defeat the purpose of the site.

All member profiles undergo a screening process; although the focus is mostly on protecting intellectual property rights and making sure members don’t disclose too much personal information, such as where they live or where their children go to school.

As far as answers about Church doctrine go, members’ answers have to be accurate. While they are encouraged to speak more conversationally and be relaxed in their answers to FAQ’s, the answers have to meet the sites objective of dispelling misinformation, not add to the pool. But, members are free to be honest in their opinions.

“If they say something like ‘I believe…’ or ‘my feelings are…’ then that’s their personal belief, we’re not in a position to tell them that’s not accurate, that’s what they believe; whatever they have to say is appropriate.”

The Web site also provides the ability for members to link to their outside blogs, Facebook pages, Twitter accounts or whatever they’re using from a social networking standpoint. Those pages will not be edited or affected in anyway, so members can use those venues to express any ideas or opinions not appropriate for a Church-sponsored Web site.

In the coming months the Church hopes to improve Mormon.org by adding enhancements and launching a major advertising campaign.

Enhancements to the site include allowing members to add more media to their profiles, such as pictures and video to fill out their personal site. Several profiles already include more media, because those members have been chosen to be apart of the ad campaign.

The Internet will carry the load of the global campaign.

“It’ll be something similar to ‘Hi, my name’s Joy. I’m a wife, I’m a mother, I live in Hawaii, I’m the world long board surf champion and I’m a Mormon.’ And then there’ll be a URL that will be Mormon.org/joy and it would take you right to her profile page, and you’ll learn more about Joy and why she’s a member, how she lives her faith, who she is and how she feels about the church,” Wilson said.

In the U.S. the advertising will include, print, radio, TV, billboards and transit.

Another enhancement the Church hopes to add is allowing members to link from their blogs, Facebook pages and so on, directly to their profile on Mormon.org.

For years bloggers have been providing links to Church Web sites, but with the new Mormon.org, and the use of individual profiles, people investigating the Church can walk into a member’s private profile instead of a big site, and they can feel comfortable looking around and branching out further into the site if they so choose.

“It would be really nice for the member of the church who owns the blog to be able to hold their hand and say 'let me take you in, this is what I believe about the Church, this is my page on the site,'” Wilson explained.

The number of member profiles on the site is growing exponentially. In the first six weeks after the Church requested members create their own profiles they had 15,000 responses. During the first week about 2,000 of those profiles will be available to view, and in the weeks to follow thousands more will begin to pop up on the site. According to Wilson, by the end of the year the Church hopes to reach 100,000 profiles.

With the number of profiles growing, Wilson hopes that eventually every person who searches on the new Mormon.org “will have somebody they can relate to.”


Feel free to check it out for yourself! www.mormon.org
And, if you're LDS create your own profile: www.mormon.org/create