Let the outreaching begin

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As Salt Lake City becomes the focus of media attention during the Olympics, members and supporters of Falun Gong turn out to decry China's suppression of the sect. Associated Press

Along with Olympic athletes and spectators, evangelists of every stripe have flooded Salt Lake City in search of converts.

As the games began yesterday, Baptist missionaries jockeyed for space on street corners with members of China's Falun Gong sect. Even the Scientologists were in town.

Of course, every Olympics would be an opportunity for mission work. Baptist delegates poured into Atlanta for the 1996 Summer Games and the American Bible Society doled out 5 million New Testaments to Olympic visitors there.

But in the shadow of the Mormon Temple, many churches have taken on a new mission: to point out the errors of the Mormons' ways. And some aren't subtle about it.

"Mormon Jesus Is the Spirit Brother of the Devil," reads the bright yellow sign that John Swortfiguer said he'll carry through Salt Lake City during the games.

Swortfiguer, a born-again Christian, flew in from Fairbanks, Alaska, to preach against what he calls the "plagiarism and libel" of the Mormon church.

He's not the only one.

One group stationed near the Mormon Temple distributed official-looking "Guides to Temple Square" that were really anti-Mormon leaflets.

"No matter how nice the people may be, the fruit of Mormonism is based on false prophecies and lies about Jesus Christ and the Bible," read another leaflet that Dale Brown, an evangelist from Bainbridge Island, Wash., was handing out.

Most evangelical Christians say members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — who believe that men can be elevated to godhood and that the Book of Mormon is the third book of the Bible — aren't Christian.

Just two years ago, the Methodist church decided that Mormons who become Methodists should be rebaptized like non-Christian converts.

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A) and Southern Baptists have similar policies.

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints account for 73 percent of Utah's population and 53 percent of Salt Lake City's residents. Most of them are determined to put the church's polygamist, racist history behind them.

"We are not weird," Gordon Hinckley, the church's 91-year-old head, has said repeatedly to out-of-town media representatives in recent weeks.

Not all those proselytizing in town are explicitly anti-Mormon. Some just don't want their message to be drowned out by the 200 Mormon missionaries greeting visitors at the church's downtown center, which is just a few blocks from the Olympic medals plaza.

The Falun Gong followers led public meditations and candlelight vigils to call attention to their suppression in China. Scientologists, who set up an exhibit about their founder, L. Ron Hubbard, in a downtown storefront, said they just wanted to reach out to visitors.

Meanwhile, the Mormons themselves have faced a quandary: Should the church, always an aggressive evangelizer, use the world spotlight to trumpet its faith and proclaim that it is a true, mainline Christian church and not, as some think, a vaguely menacing sect?

Determined not to be seen as heavy-handed, the church decided on a subtle approach. Missionaries will not buttonhole Olympic visitors seeking to convert them; they won't hand out the Book of Mormon to passers-by, only answer questions about their faith if asked.

It's a remarkable concession for a church that is the one of the fastest-growing in the world, with 11 million members and 60,000 missionaries in 162 countries bringing in 300,000 converts a year.

Not everyone thinks it can hold back.

"A devout Mormon has a hard time not talking about his church, especially on his own turf," said Sandra Tanner, a great-great-granddaughter of Brigham Young, the second president of the Mormon church. She has left the church and, with husband Jerald, writes books critical of it.

Despite the church's ban on proselytizing, it is putting on a dazzling face during the games. The televised opening yesterday included a performance by the 330-member Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

And the church has transformed its 21,000-seat Conference Center auditorium into a top-flight theater where it will stage 10 performances of "Light of the World," a theatrical and musical extravaganza.