'Sister Wives' TV Polygamist Family Welcomes 17th Child

By Gabrielle Devenish, Christian Post Reporter Friday, October 28, 2011

Polygamy is again making headlines after Kody Brown, star of the reality show “Sister Wives,” tweeted at 2:02 a.m. that baby Solomon had been born.

Solomon is the 17th child for the Brown family, born to Brown’s fourth wife, Robyn. According to The Inquisitr, Solomon – weighing 9 lbs., 10.5 oz., and measuring 22 inches long – was born in the family’s Nevada home.

"Mariah picked up Solomon and just started crying with joy," Kody Brown told reporters, according to People.com. "My second daughter was holding my newest boy and it was beautiful ... And the rest of the family got to come. It was wonderful."

Sister Wives is a TV series on TLC that follows a polygamist clan attempting “to navigate life as a ‘normal’ family in a society that shuns their lifestyle,” TLC’s website states. The family members are followers of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, one of the largest Mormon fundamentalist denominations.

The husband, Kody, has four wives: Meri, Janelle, Christine and Robyn, and the family now includes 17 combined children. The show follows how their household runs, the dynamics between the four wives and how the family wrestles with keeping their polygamy secret. They live in Las Vegas, after being, as one of the wives describes, chased out of Utah.

The show is now in its second season.

TLC is known for carrying other shocking reality series, such as “Toddlers and Tiaras” and “Hoarding – Buried Alive.”

Many people confuse FLDS with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The FLDS is a fundamentalist sect that the LDS church disavows. Still, with “Sister Wives” making headlines again, some think polygamy will make it into the current political debate, as two candidates for the GOP nomination – former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. – are both Mormons.

“People use it (polygamy) as ammunition to attack the Mormon faith all the time. I don’t think it’s valid, and I don’t think it’s useful,” said Beth Johnston, a former Mormon who is now a Christian.