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Podcast: Church History Matters
Episode: 087 Does Religion Make People More Violent?
Description: Did you know that one of the best selling books in Latter-day Saint history on Amazon.com was not written by a Latter-day Saint or a historian? It was a controversial book written by atheist Jon Krakauer in 2003 titled, Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith, which still tops the Amazon charts (in Kindle releases) in the category “Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” And an adaptation of the book was released as a mini-series in 2022.
One of the major premises of the book is that religion is inherently violent. To illustrate this prem...