wrote:



http://www.randomhouse.com/features/krakauer/


UNDER THE BANNER OF HEAVEN, he shifts his focus to extremes of
religious belief within our own borders.
At the core of his book is an appalling double murder committed by two
Mormon Fundamentalist brothers, Ron and Dan Lafferty, who insist they
received a revelation from God commanding them to kill their blameless
victims.

Beginning with a meticulously researched account of this "divinely
inspired" crime, Krakauer constructs a multilayered, bone-chilling
narrative of messianic delusion, savage violence, polygamy, and
unyielding faith. Along the way, he uncovers a shadowy offshoot of
America's fastest-growing religion, and raises provocative questions
about the nature of religious belief.


A great book. It focuses on the Mormons and their particular brand of
fundamentalism. The only problem with it is that the Mormon fundies are
even less relevant than the mainstream Mormon church. However,
Evangelical fundies are very relevant, since they have one of their own
in the White House, and they're actively trying to take over America and
turn it into a Christian Iran. The Mormon fundies mostly want to be left
alone. But the same impulse that drives the extreme Mormons drives the
Evangelicals-the desire for a pure world in which the only thoughts and
actions allowed are previously approved as having met the religious
purity acid test. In fact, that's what drives the Taliban/Al Qaeda and
the Iranian mullahs. All want people to be religiously pure and
uncompromisingly doctrinaire. That sort of devotion is impossible for
most of humanity, and can only be enforced by a brutal dictatorship.


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