Thumbs up to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which is making a determined effort to be more open about its history and tradition.

In the last two weeks, the LDS church has offered an online explanation of temple garments, which had been unfairly maligned as “magic underwear,” and has pulled back the curtain on the multiple marriages of its founder, Joseph Smith.

“Temple garments are worn by adult members of the Church who have made sacred promises of fidelity to God’s commandments and the gospel of Jesus Christ in temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” the LDS statement reveals.

Many faiths require members to don special clothing and prayer shawls, cassocks, skull caps and other items are not ridiculed. Temple garments deserve the same respect.

Smith was married multiple times — between 30 and 40 such unions — the church revealed last week, including several women who had been married to his friends. He also took a 14-year-old bride, which was both legal and fairly common at the time.

However, the Mormons pointed out in the release, there were two forms of marriage practiced by polygamists: Marriage for eternity, which were unions of faith and not of this earth, and those of life and eternity, which were weddings in the regular sense. Polygamy has been against church law and policy for more than a century.

The church is also to be commended for admitting that Smith’s actions in the final years of his life — he was killed in 1844 by an anti-Mormon mob — were an “excruciating ordeal” for his wife Emma. We applaud the LDS Church for being open and honest.

Thumbs up to the life and career of Clarence A Brimmer, who died Oct. 23 at the age of 92.

Brimmer was a native son of Wyoming, born and raised in Rawlins. He devoted his working life to his home state and nation, serving in the Army Air Corps during World War II before coming home to Rawlins, where he became a respected trial lawyer.

He was the chairman of the state Republican Party from 1967-71, attorney general from 1971-74 and U.S. attorney in 1975. That year, President Gerald Ford named him to the federal bench, and Judge Brimmer made an enduring mark there.

He served as a U.S. District Court judge for more than 30 years until he took senior status in 2006. But even then he continued to preside over trials, lowering the gavel for the final time in 2012. Lawyers felt the bite of his wit but praised his sense of fairness and respect for the law.

Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., called him “a giant.” Gov. Matt Mead, a former U.S. attorney, said Brimmer was both a good man and a gentleman.

“His legacy and his vision have impacted Wyoming for decades and will continue to have positive effect for years to come,” Mead said.

Thumbs up to the life and career of another longtime public servant, former Park County Sheriff and Commissioner Bill Brewer.

Brewer died Saturday at 76. The Powell native served for a time in the local Police Department and was also a highway patrolman. But he found his true home at the sheriff’s office, where he first served as the undersheriff before beginning a career as the county’s top law enforcement official in 1972. In the end, he served 24 years as sheriff.

Brewer also was a county commissioner, a post he held despite the challenges of age and illness for four years until he finally ended his public life in 2010.

Bill Brewer, the longest-serving sheriff in Park County history, will be laid to rest Friday. A memorial service is planned in Cody.

Thumbs down to the increase in “lone-wolf” attacks by Muslim extremists.

In the past few days we have been appalled by such attacks in Ottawa, Canada, where a recent convert to Islam, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, murdered a soldier and then attacked the Canadian Parliament before he was shot and killed, and in New York City, where Zale Thompson ran at four New York police officers with a hatchet and struck two before he was shot dead.

The religion is not to blame. Both these men were deeply troubled before they embraced Islam and misunderstood its core beliefs, thinking it commanded them to kill and harm others. They fit in with other deranged people who have caused a great deal of alarm across the globe with the rise of militant Islam.

What can be done? Can these men, since they are almost exclusively male, be watched more closely, since they are usually known to law enforcement?  They should be, we feel.

Should radical groups that seek to guide these miserable wretches be monitored? In our view, yes.

Should our borders be tightened to prevent such loaded weapons from arriving here? Perhaps, although in many cases, these are natives who become entranced with the hatred they are taught.

Most wolves slink away when they see man or are spotted by him. But there are always the diseased and the crazed lone wolves who attack.