The Name of Christ’s Church
Doctrine and Covenants 20:1
1 The rise of the Church of Christ in these last days, being one thousand eight hundred and thirty years since the coming of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in the flesh, it being regularly organized and established agreeable to the laws of our country, by the will and commandments of God, in the fourth month, and on the sixth day of the month which is called April . . .
President Joseph Fielding Smith said:
“There is no valid reason why Latter-day Saints should speak of themselves as ‘Mormons’ or of the Church as the ‘Mormon Church.’ . . . The term Latter-day Saints is added to the name [of Christ’s Church] merely to distinguish us from the former-day Saints. . . . While there can be no disgrace nor condemnation in being called ‘Mormons,’ and the . . . ‘Mormon Church,’ the fact remains, and this we should all emphasize, that we belong to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the name the Lord has given by which we are to be known and called.”
(Answers to Gospel Questions, comp. Joseph Fielding Smith Jr., 5 vols. [1957–66], 4:175.)
