{"id":17534,"date":"2015-02-04T18:20:10","date_gmt":"2015-02-05T01:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=17534"},"modified":"2015-02-04T18:55:48","modified_gmt":"2015-02-05T01:55:48","slug":"mormons-and-middle-initials","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2015\/02\/mormons-and-middle-initials.html","title":{"rendered":"Mormons and middle initials"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_17535\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-17535\" style=\"width: 252px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2015\/02\/640px-Robert_E_Lee_color.jpg\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-17535\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2015\/02\/640px-Robert_E_Lee_color-252x300.jpg\" alt=\"A portrait of Robert E. Lee\" width=\"252\" height=\"300\"><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-17535\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Robert E. Lee\u2019s surrender to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House was one of the most significant events in the storied history of Pompous Mormon Middle Initials.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m not making this up:<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>I sometimes encounter mockery from apostate <a href='https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/library\/mormonism' target='_blank'>Mormons<\/a> of the propensity of Latter-day Saint leaders to use middle initials. \u00a0It\u2019s a characteristically Mormon sign of pomposity, or something like that.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>And perhaps it <em>is<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Just <em>look<\/em> at how many Mormons have done it:<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Ulysses S. Grant<\/p>\n<p>Robert E. Lee<\/p>\n<p>John C. Calhoun<\/p>\n<p>Roger B. Taney<\/p>\n<p>Salmon P. Chase<\/p>\n<p>Chester A. Arthur<\/p>\n<p>Franklin D. Roosevelt<\/p>\n<p>Harlan F. Stone<\/p>\n<p>Benjamin N. Cardozo<\/p>\n<p>Henry A. Wallace<\/p>\n<p>Alben W. Barkley<\/p>\n<p>Harry S. Truman<\/p>\n<p>William O. Douglas<\/p>\n<p>Robert A. Taft<\/p>\n<p>Dwight D. Eisenhower<\/p>\n<p>John F. Kennedy<\/p>\n<p>Robert F. Kennedy<\/p>\n<p>Robert S. McNamara<\/p>\n<p>Lyndon B. Johnson<\/p>\n<p>Hubert H. Humphrey<\/p>\n<p>William J. Brennan, Jr.<\/p>\n<p>William F. Buckley, Jr.<\/p>\n<p>Richard M. Nixon<\/p>\n<p>Spiro T. Agnew<\/p>\n<p>Warren E. Burger<\/p>\n<p>Lewis F. Powell, Jr.<\/p>\n<p>Gerald R. Ford<\/p>\n<p>Nelson A. Rockefeller<\/p>\n<p>Walter F. Mondale<\/p>\n<p>Edward M. Kennedy<\/p>\n<p>George H. W. Bush<\/p>\n<p>George W. Bush<\/p>\n<p>John G. Roberts<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Pompous and self-important Mormons, all of them.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>And the list could be extended indefinitely.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>This has to be one of the very silliest complaints against Mormonism that I\u2019ve\u00a0ever encountered.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0 \u00a0 I\u2019m not making this up: \u00a0 I sometimes encounter mockery from apostate Mormons of the propensity of Latter-day Saint leaders to use middle initials. \u00a0It\u2019s a characteristically Mormon sign of pomposity, or something like that. \u00a0 And perhaps it is. \u00a0 Just look at how many Mormons have done it: \u00a0 Ulysses S. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17534","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Mormons and middle initials<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"&nbsp; &nbsp; I&#039;m not making this up: &nbsp; I sometimes encounter mockery from apostate Mormons of the propensity of Latter-day Saint leaders to use\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2015\/02\/mormons-and-middle-initials.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Mormons and middle initials\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"&nbsp; &nbsp; I&#039;m not making this up: &nbsp; I sometimes encounter mockery from apostate Mormons of the propensity of Latter-day Saint leaders to use\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2015\/02\/mormons-and-middle-initials.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sic et Non\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-02-05T01:20:10+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2015-02-05T01:55:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.production.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/files\/2015\/02\/640px-Robert_E_Lee_color-252x300.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dan Peterson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dan Peterson\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2015\/02\/mormons-and-middle-initials.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2015\/02\/mormons-and-middle-initials.html\",\"name\":\"Mormons and middle initials\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2015-02-05T01:20:10+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2015-02-05T01:55:48+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/77113e9b09701bd1599fa272c4f65045\"},\"description\":\"&nbsp; 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