Arrival of splinter Mormon group in West Texas makes locals wary [View All]

[Judi Lynn]

Arrival of splinter Mormon group in West Texas makes locals wary

By Michael Graczyk
ASSOCIATED PRESS
1:18 p.m. March 17, 2005

ELDORADO, Texas – With the legal heat rising against its leader in Arizona and Utah, a splinter group of polygamous Mormons is hurriedly building a new community in sparsely populated West Texas.

But the arrival of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints – marked by a temple tower rising out of the rocky terrain and prickly pear cactus – has been about as welcome among locals as a new species of rattlesnake.

"I think there's reason to be apprehensive, but they've done nothing to warrant any kind of great fear," Schleicher County Judge Johnny Griffin said. "But it's the unknown. ... It's the secrecy that bothers most people."

The congregation, known as FLDS and led by reclusive prophet Warren Jeffs, is one of several groups that split from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints after the mainline faith renounced polygamy in 1890.

The FLDS began migrating 77 years ago to a remote area along the Utah-Arizona state line, where its members live in almost complete seclusion in the twin towns of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz. Members are not allowed newspapers, radio, TV or the Internet – and are forbidden to speak with outsiders.
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http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/20050317-1318-wst-polygamistsect.html

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They don't read, they don't know what the *bleep's* going on, you'd think Texas Republicans would be WILD to see them moving to Texas.
Free votes! Don't have to cheat!