Gardner's date with firing squad revives talk of Mormon blood atonement - Salt Lake Tribune

Gardner's date with firing squad revives talk of Mormon blood atonement - Salt Lake Tribune: "Mormon doctrine was 'full of promised blessings for the obedient, blessings which were not forthcoming as the Saints were driven from pillar to post,' says Peterson, who now lives in Issaquah, Wash. 'An obverse logic took over: The Saints were obviously remiss in their duties; they deserved to suffer; the quickest way back to divine favor was to inflict more suffering on themselves.'
Their approach, he says, would be similar to that of Roman Catholics during the Middle Ages in the aftermath of the plague, which decimated Europe. Religious orders in which members would flog themselves as penance 'arose to deal with the psychological effect of the terrible scourge.'
The idea of self-punishing was central to the 'guilt I inherited or felt in the people around me,' says Peterson, who was reared in a small Mormon community in northern Arizona. 'We believed in a severe God who didn't forgive easily. You had to pay with some kind of pain.'
Blood atonement also figured in Peterson's novel The Backslider , when one character's throat is cut to atone for his homosexual behavior and the protagonist considers killing himself for his continued sexual sins."