ABSTRACT
George Reynolds believed firmly in his Mormon faith at a time when it was anathema to many Americans. He emigrated to the United States in 1865, and then trekked overland to the Utah Territory, where Mormons had migrated in the hope of establishing a new Zion. The Mormons comprise the most populous branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS). The various doctrines pursued by the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Anglican Communion, and Trinitarian Protestantism were all abominations in the sight of God, and had in fact been foretold as such in the second book of Thessalonians. The disdain with which Mormonism viewed mainstream Christian faiths accounted for some of the hostility against it, as did its belief in a theocratic form of government—that is, rule of the government and society by Church leaders according to Church doctrine.
