The Mormon church recently released new material that teaches polygamy to children.

The LDS Church Is Now Teaching Polygamy to Children. Ask Yourself Why.

The Mormon church has quietly released new curriculum materials that introduce polygamy to children, and the timing raises a question that deserves a direct answer: what exactly is the church teaching, and what is it leaving out? Mormon polygamy is back in the classroom, framed through an institutional lens that has historically minimized coercion, power imbalance, and the documented suffering of the women involved.

This is not a peripheral historical footnote. It is one of the most contested and consequential practices in LDS history, and the decision to teach it to young people without full context is an editorial choice with real consequences.

Mormon Polygamy and the Historical Record Children Won't Hear

Joseph Smith practiced plural marriage beginning in the 1830s. By the time of his death in 1844, he had taken somewhere between 30 and 40 wives, depending on the historical source. That number includes teenagers. It includes women already married to other men. It includes proposals delivered with explicit or implied warnings about spiritual consequences for those who refused.

The LDS Church's own Gospel Topics Essays, published starting in 2013, confirmed many of these details. The essays were not prominently announced. Many members learned about them from sources like the Mormon Stories Podcast rather than from their local congregation.