facial hair
LDS Church President Brigham Young had a beard but wouldn’t be allowed to wear it today. Photo courtesy RNS.
If they were alive today, nearly half the presidents of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — from Brigham Young in the 19th century through George Albert Smith in the 1940s — would be forbidden from serving in the faith’s 141 temples worldwide.
That’s because being clean-shaven is generally a requirement for men to be Mormon temple workers. Whiskers are fine for temple-going members, but even nicely trimmed beards and mustaches are no-nos for temple workers.
“It is ironic that temple workers are expected to be more clean-shaven than the deity figures — God and Jesus Christ — portrayed in LDS films and portraits,” says Armand Mauss, a leading Mormon sociologist in Irvine, Calif.