Mormon Passage: A Missionary Chronicle.

Alexander, Thomas G.

Passage: A Missionary Chronicle. By Gary and Gordon Shepherd. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1998. xvi + 456 pp. $49.95 cloth; $24.95 paper.

Since the organization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) in 1830, proselytizing b), lay missionaries has played a central role both in the rapid growth of the church and in the socialization and religious commitment of young men and, more recently, of young women. Most missionaries keep diaries in which they record their mission activities. Some of the nineteenth-century diaries have appeared in print. In Mormon Passage we have the compilation of the diary entries and selected letters of twin brothers who served as missionaries in the Veracruz and Mexico City missions during the mid-1960s.

In many ways the Shepherds offer us two books. The first is a typical compilation of journal entries and letters written in the religious language familiar to Latter-day Saints. This book tells of the problems of finding and teaching people, of the difficulties the missionaries experienced in living and working together, and of the relationships between missionaries and investigators, the religious opposition, and church members. The second book is a social-scientific analysis of the mission experience. This book appears in the preface and introduction, in an introductory analysis and overview in various chapters, and in the final chapter of the book. The second book reflects the orientation of the authors, who returned from their missions to become academic sociologists.

The missionary experience told in the first book is quite typical of young men who serve missions. The Shepherd twins grew up and attended school in Salt Lake City. After National Guard training, the two received mission calls. Following a typical farewell service in their ward sacrament meeting, the two entered what was then called the Language Training Mission (now the Mission Training Center) in Provo, Utah. There they spent three months studying proselytizing methods and the Spanish language. On August 20, 1964, they left for their two-year missions. Each achieved considerable success both in number of converts and in calls to positions of responsibility. Both of the brothers eventually became assistants to their mission presidents, which is the most responsible calling a young missionary can expect to receive.

Their experiences seem typical of those who labored in Latin America during the period. In the 1960s Latin American missionaries experienced astounding success. Those who worked hard like the Shepherd brothers tended to baptize scores of people during a two-year mission. By contrast, even diligent missionaries who served during the same period in western Europe and the eastern and midwestern United States tended to achieve more modest success.

For the most part, the missionaries followed a pattern of contacting and teaching devised shortly after World War II. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, missionaries contacted people, distributed tracts, and taught lessons of their own making. Shortly after World War II, the church prescribed a set of standard lessons that the missionaries were instructed to use in teaching investigators. These lessons emphasized the prophetic calling of the church's founder, Joseph Smith; the restoration of Christ's primitive church; continuous revelation; the Godhead; Christ's Atonement; the need for faith, repentance, baptism, and the gift of the Holy Ghost; the eternal progression and unity of the family; refraining from the use of tobacco, alcohol, tea, and coffee; and the payment of a full tithe. Like most missionaries of the time, the Shepherds found most investigators through "tracting"--systematic door-to-door contacting.

Along with their success, the Shepherds, like other missionaries, experienced serious opposition. The Catholic clergy challenged them on several fronts. Clergymen emphasized tradition and community solidarity. This emphasis led many to shun the missionaries. In some cases, the force of anti-Mormon campaigns led employers to fire those who joined the LDS church. The Catholic clergy also spread anti-Mormon propaganda, some of it outright falsehoods such as that Mormons continued to practice polygamy or that they were not Christians. Evangelical Protestants countered missionary efforts as well. Evangelicals tended to rely on biblical proof texts, arguing the error of Mormon doctrine.

The Mormon missionaries countered the opposition in various ways. They presented their message, used counter-proof-texts, offered a personal example, testified to the falsehood of various allegations, proclaimed their faith in Christ, and developed close friendships with investigators. Some also engaged in fruitless debates.

Beyond the outside opposition, the missionaries also faced considerable difficulty within the church. Branches were often small and members inexperienced. Some missionaries declined to work very hard, and others developed infatuations with young female members. Members frequently failed to fellowship the new converts. In general by the time of baptism the converts had developed a close attachment to the missionaries. When those missionaries left, the converts often felt disconnected. Some returned to their former lives. Others remained on the church records but fell into inactivity.

As the Shepherds and others have argued, the retention of converts was then and still is an extreme challenge for the LDS church. The retention rate in Mexico and much of Latin America during the 1960s stood at about a third. James Allen and I found a retention rate of about 50 percent in the Manchester, England, branch while editing and publishing William Clayton's journal as Manchester Mormons: The Journal of William Clayton, 1840 to 1842 (Santa Barbara: Peregrine Smith, 1974).

Since this book offers both religious and scholarly perspectives on Mormon missionary work during the period since World War II, I would recommend it for scholars and lay people. To a former missionary, the diary entries ring true as typical of the experiences and attitudes of proselytizing elders. The analysis seems useful as a way of understanding Mormon missions from a scholarly perspective as well.

Thomas G. Alexander Brigham Young University