![Poster for \"Mormons Offer\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2015\/09\/A_Victim_Of_The_Mormons_1.jpg\")
<\/a><\/a>I really enjoyed this article by my friend Robert Starling, who is a multi-decade veteran of the film and television industry and who co-founded the organization called Associated Latter-day Media Artists, or ALMA: \u00a0\u201cThe (Lord\u2019s Media) Empire Strikes Back \u2013 with the light saber of truth.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0 If, like me, you\u2019re interested in the image of Latter-day Saints in the media and\/or you\u2019re hoping that we will continue to develop our own artistic, literary, musical, and cinematic expressions, I think that you\u2019ll find his article well worth your time.<\/p>\n And, while I\u2019m thinking about films and the Restoration, I\u2019m going to remind you yet again \u2014 and not for the last time \u2014 that there will be one final opportunity to catch a \u201csneak peak\u201d early screening of Six Days in August<\/em> prior to its general release into theaters on Thursday, 10 October. \u00a0That will be on 7 October, the Monday following this weekend\u2019s General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints<\/a>. \u00a0Nine Cinemark theaters on the Wasatch Front \u2014 in American Fork, Draper, Farmington, Ogden, Orem, Provo, Salt Lake City, Sandy\/Midvale, and West Jordan \u2014 will be offering these advance looks: \u00a0Six Days in August<\/em> \u2013 Early Access<\/a><\/p>\n You may be aware of the bitter controversy and the multiple legal challenges that have delayed work on the long-announced Cody Wyoming Temple<\/a>. \u00a0Passionate opponents have sought to block its construction and to force it to be moved somewhere else. \u00a0They have alleged that the 9,950-square-foot temple \u2014 by a considerable margin one of the smallest ever built by the Church \u2014 which is planned to sit in the center of a 4.69-acre parcel of landscaped private grounds, will dominate Cody\u2019s skyline, looming over the city, blocking views of the mountains and the night sky, destroying its environment, and ruining its neighborhood, and that it constitutes an arrogant attempt on the part of the Church to dominate the town and to impose Latter-day Saint theological tenets upon the innocent residents of a mostly non-Latter-day Saint area. \u00a0(By the way, it took me about ten seconds to find a house for sale in Cody that \u2014 at 9,148 square feet \u2014 is very nearly the same size as the future temple. \u00a0There are probably others, and perhaps some that are even larger.)<\/p>\n Owing to a series of favorable local-government votes and judicial rulings, however, construction work has finally commenced on the building: \u00a0\u201cGround Broken for Cody Wyoming Temple:\u00a0The third house of the Lord in the state\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n This pleases me very much, and so I include here a link to photographs of the groundbreaking ceremony: Cody Wyoming Temple Photograph Gallery: Construction<\/a>. \u00a0I\u2019ll admit, though, that I can\u2019t quite see \u2014 from these photographs, at least, which were taken at the site itself \u2014 how the temple will dominate Cody\u2019s skyline, loom over the city, or block views of the mountains and the night sky. \u00a0Please take a quick look at them for yourself. \u00a0Maybe I\u2019ll need to drive up there someday and do a closer personal inspection.<\/p>\n Many years ago, during my mission in Switzerland, I happened upon a collection of clippings focused on the construction, twenty years before, in Zollikofen b. Bern, of the first temple in Europe<\/a>. \u00a0One of the articles, an editorial opposing the building of that temple, included an image of the Salt Lake Temple imposed upon the actual site there in a wooded suburb of the Swiss federal capital, Bern \u2014 plopped right down in the middle of a residential neighborhood of quiet middle-class houses. \u00a0The image was roughly four or five times the size of the real Salt Lake Temple. \u00a0It was large enough and tall enough that it might well, if built, have interfered with aviation and changed local weather patterns. \u00a0The question essentially posed by the editorial was, \u201cDo you want this in your neighborhood?\u201d \u00a0And, of course, no sane person would<\/em>. \u00a0Nor did anybody ever have any intention<\/em> of creating such a monstrosity. \u00a0The image was pure demagogic sensationalism.<\/p>\n I think that the outrage that has been provoked by the Cody Wyoming Temple sets the proper mood for my conclusion: \u00a0You have every reason to despair when you see the evils done by theists and theism in this otherwise wonderful world of ours. \u00a0Nevertheless, and without meaning to pile on, I feel it my duty to keep you informed, to the extent that I\u2019m able to do so, of the details of the religious atrocities that I find in the Christopher Hitchens Memorial \u201cHow Religion Poisons Everything\u201d File<\/em>\u2122. \u00a0Here are just a few recent specimens:<\/p>\n \u201cPlagued by a Youth Suicide Epidemic, Provo, Utah, Worked Together to Find a Remedy\u2014and Became 2024\u2019s Nicest Place in America\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cHow the Church of Jesus Christ Is Helping Those Affected by Hurricane Helene:\u00a0Latter-day Saints are assisting thousands after the storm brought widespread damage and flooding across the southeastern United States\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cBYU fans turn out in droves to support Kansas State QB\u2019s cancer fund drive\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cPrincipal at center of Kansas State QB\u2019s fundraiser thanks BYU fans for their support:\u00a0More than $50,000 has been raised on behalf of Avery Johnson\u2019s high school principal, who was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/a>