April 6th is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints Day

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the LDS Church or, informally, the Mormon Church) is a Christian restorationist church that considers itself to be the restoration of the church founded by Jesus Christ. The church is headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, and has established congregations (called wards or branches) and built temples worldwide. According to the church, it has over 80,000 missionaries worldwide and a membership of over 15 million. It is ranked by the National Council of Churches as the fourth largest Christian denomination in the United States. It is the largest denomination in the Latter Day Saint movement founded by Joseph Smith during the period of religious revival known as the Second Great Awakening.

The early history of the LDS Church is shared with other denominations of the Latter Day Saint movement, who all regard Joseph Smith, Jr. as the founder of their religious tradition. Smith gained a small following in the late 1820s as he was dictating the Book of Mormon, which he said was a translation of words found on the Golden Plates that had been buried near his home in western New York by an indigenous American prophet. Smith said he had been in contact with an angel Moroni, who showed him the plates' location and had been grooming him for a role as a religious leader.

On April 6, 1830, in western New York, Smith organized the religion's first legal church entity, the Church of Christ. The church rapidly gained a following, who viewed Smith as their prophet. In late 1830, Smith envisioned a "city of Zion", a Utopian city in Native American lands near Independence, Missouri. In October 1830, he sent his Assistant President, Oliver Cowdery, and others on a mission to the area. Passing through Kirtland, Ohio, the missionaries converted a congregation of Disciples of Christ led by Sidney Rigdon, and in 1831, Smith decided to temporarily move his followers to Kirtland until lands in the Missouri area could be purchased. In the meantime, the church's headquarters remained in Kirtland from 1831 to 1838; and there the church built its first temple and continued to grow in membership from 680 to 17,881.