Ever since I became aware of Mormons Made Simple I have been considering whether I should share the site with others. It is intended to be a resource for those who are not familiar with the LDS church to understand the church as an organization and as a culture. My conflict was not that it is a poor or misleading site – it isn’t as far as I can see – but rather that it is not an official site from the church and I prefer to point people to the official sources of things – especially since the church has an official site specifically for those who are not members of the church.
In and of itself my initial question does not seem widely important, but it led me to another more general question which I thought about for some time. Is it a good thing for members of the church to create their own resources when the church has already provided resources for the same specific purpose? My conclusion was that we have been commanded to “do many things of their own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness.” (Doctrine and Covenants 58:27) I could not predict how much righteousness might come to pass from Mormons Made Simple, but it seems a good thing for people to be doing of their own free will.
My question for other people is, would you be more likely to recommend the official site, or the unofficial site to people? Are there times when one might be better than the other?
Have you seen the about.com stuff? While I haven’t read the Mormons Made Simple site, it seems similar to what you wrote about. See lds.about.com
I had not seen lds.about.com. Having looked there I would say that Mormons Made Simple is a little more like mormon.org than it is like lds.about.com