The Unspoken Divide

Alex Sepulveda lost his best buddy when he was 11 years old. The boy didn't die, but the friendship did, for one simple reason: Alex was not Mormon. The breakup hit Sepulveda, now 25, like a sucker punch in the gut.

"I was going to sleep over at his house on a Friday night, but then he came up to me and said I couldn't come over because his parents said I was a bad influence.

"That was it. We never hung out after that," says Sepulveda, reared without religion. "We'd see each other in the school hallway and wouldn't even say hi."

The hurt persisted until the day both boys slipped out of childhood and into their black caps and gowns. At the end of the high school graduation ceremony, Sepulveda was asked to stand and be recognized.

"I remember . . . hoping his parents were looking at me and thinking: 'Oh? The bad influence is going to Harvard?'"

Such hard feelings haunt every Utah community. It is a bad blood that flows both ways, and for some it is bitter. For others, it is so faint it scarcely registers.

For Mormon Joan Schneiter, a drama teacher, it can be just plain annoying. She points to parties where she and her husband almost feel they have to defend themselves for picking Sprite over something stronger. "When Mormons sit down at dinner and never take a drink, they can be very judgmental of those drinking [alcohol]," she says. "But sometimes the Mormons are being judged for not drinking."

Countless friendships, partnerships and marriages have bridged the Mormon/non-Mormon divide. But every day secret scores are kept on both sides. Classifications are so constant they are almost unconscious: Is that a garment line? Is she drinking coffee? Are you from pioneer stock?

He is one of us. She is one of them. A poll conducted for The Salt Lake Tribune shows fully two-thirds of Utahns recognize a Mormon/non-Mormon fault line within the state. Salt Lake City's 2002 Winter Games are just weeks away. For many Mormons, it is more than just a sporting event. It is a chance to showcase how one of the most forbidding regions in the country was made to "blossom as a rose." It is an opportunity to shine a light on America's fastest-growing religion, and the family-centered culture that makes it work.

For three weeks in February, the red carpet will be rolled out to welcome the world--and to cover up our cultural fractures. But the big show will be over by March. The carpet will be rolled up, and the divide will remain.

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