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Mormon Passage: A Missionary Chronicle. By Gary and Gordon Shepherd. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1998. xvi + 456 pp. $49.95 cloth; $24.95 paper.
Since the organization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) in 1830, proselytizing by lay missionaries has played a central role both in the rapid growth of the church and in the socialization and religious commitment of young men and, more recently, of young women. Most missionaries keep diaries in which they record their mission activities. Some of the nineteenth-century diaries have appeared in print. In Mormon Passage we have the compilation of the diary entries and selected letters of twin brothers who served as missionaries in the Veracruz and Mexico City missions during the mid-1960s.
In many ways the Shepherds offer us two books. The first is a typical compilation of journal entries and letters written in the religious language familiar to Latter-day Saints. This book tells of the problems of finding and teaching people, of the difficulties the missionaries experienced in living and working together, and of the relationships between missionaries and investigators, the religious opposition, and church members. The second book is a social-scientific analysis of the mission experience. This book appears in the preface and introduction, in an introductory analysis and overview in various chapters, and in the final chapter of the book. The second book reflects the orientation of the authors, who returned from their missions to...