Church of Jesus Christ

The Church of Jesus Christ is a denomination of the Latter Day Saint movement headquartered in Independence, Missouri, United States. The church derives its epithet from its founder, Alpheus Cutler, a member of the Nauvoo High Council and of Joseph Smith's Council of Fifty. Cutler justified his establishment of an independent church organization by asserting that God had "rejected" Smith's organization—but not his priesthood—following Smith's death, but that Smith had named Cutler to a singular "Quorum of Seven" in anticipation of this event, with a unique prerogative to reorganize the church that no one beyond this group possessed. Hence, Cutler's organization claims to be the only legitimate Latter Day Saint church in the world today. Currently, it has only one branch, located in Independence. The Cutlerite church retains an endowment ceremony believed to date to the Nauvoo period, practices the United Order of Enoch, and accepts baptism for the dead, but not eternal marriage or polygamy.

Alpheus Cutler was a Latter Day Saint leader and contemporary of Joseph Smith who converted to Smith's Church of Christ in January 1833, being baptized in western New York by David W. Patten. Cutler attended Smith's School of the Prophets in Kirtland, Ohio, and assisted in the construction of the Kirtland Temple there. In 1838, during the dedication of cornerstones for the Far West Temple, Cutler was named by Smith as "chief architect and master workman of all God's holy houses". Cutler was later appointed a member of the Nauvoo Temple construction committee, after enduring the expulsion of the Latter Day Saints from Missouri. In Nauvoo, he served on the High Council, and was named to Smith's Council of Fifty. Prior to Smith's murder in 1844, Cutler was called on a mission to the "Lamanites" . However, he had not yet departed when Smith was assassinated on June 27 at the jail in Carthage, Illinois.

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