The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, informally known as the LDS Church or Mormon Church, is the largest Latter Day Saint denomination. Founded by Joseph Smith during the Second Great Awakening, the church is headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, and has established congregations and built temples worldwide. According to the church, as of 2023, it has over 17.2 million members of which over 6.8 million live in the U.S. The church also reports over 99,000 volunteer missionaries and 350 temples.
In Mormonism, the restoration refers to a return of the authentic priesthood power, spiritual gifts, ordinances, living prophets and revelation of the primitive Church of Christ after a long period of apostasy. While in some contexts the term may also refer to the early history of Mormonism, in other contexts the term is used in a way to include the time that has elapsed from the church's earliest beginnings until the present day. Especially in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints "the restoration" is often used also as a term to encompass the corpus of religious messages from its general leaders down to the present.
The Latter Day Saint movement is the collection of independent church groups that trace their origins to a Christian Restorationist movement founded by Joseph Smith in the late 1820s.
Temple Square is a 10-acre (4.0 ha) complex, owned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in the center of Salt Lake City, Utah. The usage of the name has gradually changed to include several other church facilities that are immediately adjacent to Temple Square. Contained within Temple Square are the Salt Lake Temple, Salt Lake Tabernacle, Salt Lake Assembly Hall, the Seagull Monument, and two visitors' centers. The square was designated a National Historic Landmark District in 1964, recognizing the Mormon achievement in the settlement of Utah.
Legacy: A Mormon Journey is a 53-minute film produced by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Legacy depicts the life of two recent converts from the 1830s to the 1890s. The characters are fictional, though the events they experience are historical.
Merrill Boyd Jenson is an American composer and arranger who has composed film scores for over thirty films including Emma Smith: My Story, Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration, The Testaments of One Fold and One Shepherd, Legacy, Harry's War, and Windwalker. Many of the films Jenson composed music for were directed by Academy Award-winning director Kieth Merrill. Jenson has also composed several concert productions including a symphony that premiered at Carnegie Hall. Additionally, he has composed music for many television commercials including the acclaimed Homefront ads, music for three outdoor pageants, and several albums. Jenson lives in Provo, Utah with his wife Betsy Lee Jenson.
Eldred Gee Smith was the patriarch to the church of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 1947 to 1979. From 1979 to his death he was the patriarch emeritus of the church. He was the oldest and longest-serving general authority in the history of the church, although he had not been active in that capacity from 1979 to his death.
Hyrum Gibbs Smith was Presiding Patriarch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 1912 until his death.
Andrew Jenson, born Anders Jensen, was a Danish immigrant to the United States who acted as an Assistant Church Historian of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for much of the early-20th century. Jenson also served the church as president of the Scandinavian Mission.
Junius Free Wells was the first head of the Young Men's Mutual Improvement Association, an organization which is today the Young Men organization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He also was a magazine founder, an author, and the chief organizer of the LDS Church's efforts to build a number of historical monuments in the early 1900s.
In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a temple is a building dedicated to be a House of the Lord. Temples are considered by church members to be the most sacred structures on earth.
The Church Administration Building (CAB) is an administrative office building in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States serving as the headquarters of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), the fourth-largest Christian denomination in the United States. Completed in 1917, the building is adjacent to Temple Square, between the Joseph Smith Memorial Building and the Lion House, on South Temple Drive. It differs from the Church Office Building in that it is much smaller and furnishes offices for the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. It also houses offices for other general authorities and their personal staff.
In the theology of the Latter Day Saint movement, an endowment refers to a gift of "power from on high", typically associated with the ordinances performed in Latter Day Saint temples. The purpose and meaning of the endowment varied during the life of movement founder Joseph Smith. The term has referred to many such gifts of heavenly power, including the confirmation ritual, the institution of the High Priesthood in 1831, events and rituals occurring in the Kirtland Temple in the mid-1830s, and an elaborate ritual performed in the Nauvoo Temple in the 1840s.
Although the media has always been important in the church's growth, public relations of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has become increasingly important since the church's growth internationally after World War II. By the 1960s and 1970s, the LDS Church was no longer primarily an Intermountain West–based church, or even a United States–based church. The church's organized public relations efforts have deep roots. The Bureau of Information, the predecessor of the Temple Square Visitors Centers was started on Temple Square in Salt Lake City with Le Roi Snow, a son of Lorenzo Snow, as the first director.
The name of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is derived from an 1838 revelation church founder Joseph Smith said he received. Church leaders have long emphasized the church's full name, and have resisted the application of informal or shortened names, especially those which omit "Jesus Christ". These informal and shortened names include the "Mormon Church", the "LDS Church", and the "Church of the Latter-day Saints".
The following outline is provided as an overview of and a topical guide to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
This is a bibliography of works on the Latter Day Saint movement.
