They tried this back in 2001, just before the 2002 Salt Lake Olympics. It was hard for my [del]Mormon[/del] LDS mother, but she managed to reduce it from her vocabulary.
Then suddenly in 2010 or so, the church reversed course and started an “I am a Mormon” TV commercial campaign. My mother enjoying being able to say she’s a Mormon again.
Now, 18 years later, it’s back to not being a Mormon.
They should rebrand themselves as The Church of Jesus Christ of Ladder Day Saints, each of them required to always carry a ladder in anticipation of Ladder Day, when the trap doors of Heaven will open and everyone with a ladder can climb up.
What exactly do they think they are accomplishing with this? It would be one thing if “Mormon” was used primarily as a pejorative, but it’s not. And telling people not to abbreviate their long name? Don’t have a long name.
And do they really think claiming God told them this insignificant tripe makes them seem like they’re more in touch with God? God doesn’t change his mind, and you can’t keep pushing the “God allowed it in the past” angle. And the excuse used for polygamy barely worked back then.
Sure, maybe any Mormon will go along with it, since they go along with a lot already. But Mormonism is very much about prosthelytizing. Do you really think they’ll agree to follow this God that’s into petty, unimportant things like semantics?
It’s going to take divine intervention to get people to start using Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in general conversation.
The lines in the song “I Believe” will have to be changed to,
“I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints,
and a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints just believes.”
Whichever title ends up being actually used will become pejorative over time anyway, if it isn’t already. The long name sounds euphemistic (because it is), and any group that insists on being referred to only by euphemism is embarrassed to exist. Which, in this particular case, is unfortunately quite justifiable.
Maybe they think they can fool dyslexics into believing that attending church is a trip. Maybe they can rewrite the song as “Lucy in the Diamond Sky?”
And do they need to recall and rename the book?