For nearly a decade, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been engaged in a top-down rebrand meant partly to solidify its focus and bona fides as a Christian religion.
The U.S. Department of Defense, led by conservative evangelical Pete Hegseth, appears unconvinced.
On Friday, spokesperson Sean Parnell confirmed on social media a report that the department had trimmed its list of recognized religious affiliations, used by its chaplains, from more than 200 to 31.
The Latter-day Saint faith was among those to make the cut. But there was a catch.
The list denotes 20 faiths as Christian, including Catholic, Orthodox Christian, Baptist and Jehovah’s Witnesses. Not, however, the Utah-based faith.
Asked by The Salt Lake Tribune if this omission was intentional, a member of the department’s press team pointed to the statement posted by Parnell.
The Office of the Secretary of War is announcing a significant change to the Department’s categorization of religious affiliation. In a long overdue move, we reduced the list from over 200 unmanageable categories to 31. With this move, we are returning to the original intent of… https://t.co/dgHX5ytzjJ pic.twitter.com/eho537O08J — Sean Parnell (@SeanParnellASW) June 5, 2026
“This decrease in religious affiliation codes is not designed to make any claims on the legitimacy of any faith or religious belief, nor is it intended to provide a list of ‘officially approved’ religions,” he wrote. “Rather, it is designed to allow chaplains to quickly look at the religious composition of their units and determine how they structure resources to best provide for warfighters of all faith groups.”
However, an accompanying video by Hegseth seemed to suggest the change wasn’t entirely one of streamlining bureaucracy.
“In previous administrations, our Chaplain Corps was infected by political correctness and secular humanism,” he said. “…Faith and virtue were traded for self-help and self-care. We started correcting that drift [in December], and today we’re going further.”
Asked if the church planned to respond, a spokesperson for the faith pointed to the FAQ portion of its website. It reads: “Latter-day Saints believe God sent his son, Jesus Christ, to save all mankind from death and their individual sins. Jesus Christ is central to the lives of church members.”
Utah Sens. Mike Lee and John Curtis, both members of the church, took to social media Saturday to condemn the seeming snub, with Curtis stating he is “working now to ensure a correction is made.”
Among those eliminated were Unitarian Universalists, various Wiccans, deists, atheists and others, according to Military.com, the first to report the news.
They follow Christ, don’t they? Or do Mormons have a different savior and God than other Christians?
Christ is the central figure and all teachings are based on him. It’s Christianity. But other groups in Christianity try to define it based on their interpretations of what they think Christiaity means. So some of them try to say mormons aren’t but it’s a skewed metric. It’s centered on Christ, that’s Christianity.
As a former Mor[m]on, a lot of the pushback about not being Christian is usually tied up in the doctrines about Jesus and individual salvation.
For example, the church teaches, though in a roundabout way, that Mary was physically impregnated by God. (Though, this should be a point in their favor since Republicans love child r@pe.)
Also, for those who qualify, they can become gods themselves and have their planets and stuff. Since the church doesn’t go into details, there is debate whether that means each new god would need a new Jesus or that the Original Jesus’™ sacrifice applies to the new gods’ domains.
Dope, I love when religion and sci-fi mix. Now I’m imagining space Mormon mini gods vying for power and influence over the galaxy like the Goa’uld in SG1. Also the main reason scientology is such a hoot and a half.
There’s a reason why so many comic conventions stop off in SLC. When you’re not allowed to have kinky sex, drink, or smoke to let off tension, the really devout ones have their interests come out in very creative ways.
Mormons are the biggest god damn nerds you will ever meet, because they’re not allowed to have other hobbies.
Battlestar Galactica and Stargate both had Mormon writers. So did Dungeons and Dragons.
And event wickng and jump humping. It is so stupid all these hahah god didn’t say this just have sex your already doing it with extra steps.
Funny enough, so are most people deep into bdsm, at least so far as I’ve met them. People into bdsm are the band / anime nerds and swingers are the cheerleaders and jocks.
That’d be dope. I used to think that everyone who becomes a god gets their own universe. The cross over potential would be awesome.
Hell, let’s throw the Q Continuum in as well.
I can only imagine the Q playing games with the Goa’uld system lord’s and Mormon mini gods. Toss in the Demiurge for good measure and maybe a few Jedi.
Personally, as a Mormon minigod, I’d totally make some Xenomorphs just to mess with everyone. “Oops! I was messing around. I have noooooo clue how they got out. UwU.”
And we wonder why our world is so fucked. Probably some dude just messing around for the lolz.
Don’t they have an exact number of people through all time they think are getting into heaven? It’s not a very large number either.
That’s the Jehovah’s Witnesses - 144,000. Though I thought they had removed the cap. I’m too lazy and apathetic to check though.
ah yes. 100 gross. clearly one of their higher ups did warehouse work at some point.
Base twelve was more common in previous centuries. This is going back to the good old days, not current events.
That’s Jehovah’s Witnesses. Mormons actually believe in 3 heavens: the Celestial Kingdom (for gold-medal Mormons only), the Terrestrial Kingdom (for regular Christians and basically decent people), and the Telestial Kingdom (made up word for the free tier of their holy subscription service. This is the one your buddy Jesus already paid for.)
Their version of Hell is actually extremely hard to get into. You basically have to look God in the face as one of his prophets and tell him where he can stick it. AFAIK, the canonical shitlist in Mormonism is, like, three names long.
Religious people are already weird voodoo believers. Mormons just take it even further.
Also, IIRC, Jesus “was” the savior, but they believe that we needed more than him to save us because the world is icky icky. Jesus teachings got relegated to “good guidelines to follow” but John Smith “revised” Christianity when God supposedly spoke to him.
Or something. Religion is fucking stupid.
I thought it was Jesus part two: the american continent as told by John Smith aka the stories aren’t about Johnny boy.
Jesus 2: Electric Bugaloo