Mitt Romney’s Mormon faith has hovered over his 20-year political career like a thick layer of incense at Easter Mass. Negative perceptions of the religion so worried his 2008 presidential team that the dilemma had its own acronym in campaign power point presentations: TMT (That Mormon Thing).
Worries persisted this year as skeptical evangelical Christians flocked to other candidates””any other candidate it seemed ”” causing Romney to avoid all things Mormon in public….
Read it all. Also, Jacques Berlinerblau has further thoughts on this in “How Romney should talk about religion”.
The political world is asymmetrical. The President can sit in Wright’s church and get away with saying he never heard any of the raw racism. However, the reverse is not true for people on the conservative side, whether secular or religious. Until the president/prophet of LDS had a revelation in 1978, only whites were eligible to hold the highest priesthood. (A LDS friend at the time commented that the revelation occurred about the same time as the majority of LDS members were non-white.) Romney will be asked about this. Given his poor response to charges about his wealth, an obvious wedge issue, it could be a telling blow. I am not certain whether there [b]is[/b] a good answer [i]in our political environment.[/i]
In November, we are electing the president of the United States, not a presiding bishop. As such, having an executive of good moral character in the White House, a man of honor, is more important than him being of one particular denomination or religion. I respect the candidates’ right to privacy. After all, isn’t that Freedom of Religion?
I thought Romney put it accurately last night with Diane Sawyer: I’m not running for Pastor-in Chief, I’m running for Commander-in-Chief.
I find it untolerant of those on the right who say thay could never vote for a Mormon; was Cyrus a believer?
We need a person of integrity, a person who practices the qualities of compassion, family, patriotism. Whether that person is a man or a woman, Christian or non-Christian is not the issue. Let’s face it: God can use whosomever He pleases to lead the Country out of dispair, debt, and decadence!
If Romney claims to be a good Mormon, for him to deny the tenants of his faith would tell us a good deal about his character. The suggestions by others that he deny his faith tells us a good deal about them.
As a Christian I find much in Mormonism that I dislike, but I expect Romney to be faithful to its teachings, other wise he is a hypocrite. Like I said this line of questioning tells us much about media liberals.
RE: “I find it untolerant of those on the right who say thay could never vote for a Mormon . . .”
DrJoan, I’m curious as to whether you’d ever vote for, say, a Scientologist as President?
I would, as a matter of fact — I’ll vote for practically anyone of any religion who has as his or her priorities the Constitution, individual liberty, free enterprise, private property rights, and limited government [which is the only reason I won’t be voting for Romney.]
But there are plenty of those out there who, understandably, wouldn’t vote for a Scientologist or Rastiferian or a Mormon. I understand that, personally. I don’t really agree — as I said I’d vote for a person of almost any faith [maybe the child sacrifice ones would be exceptions] as long as his *political values* matched mine in word and action.
I find the people squawking about Having To Vote For Romney Despite His Mormonism to be a bit . . . self-serving?
I don’t think most of them are consistent with that principle. Why can’t people factor in a person’s faith as one of the attributes that tells them a lot about the person for whom they’re voting? Where is the wrongdoing in that?
I don’t see it.
#3 Does anyone know when and why presidents ceased to be called “Chief Magistrate” and began to be called “Commander in Chief”?
I care a whole lot more about what kind of man he is, not his religion, which happens to be HIS business and not ours. It matters more to me that he be fit for the job, that he be a Chief Executive and Commander in Chief who can make the tough decisions for tough times, while knowing full well that he won’t be able to please everyone…..and shouldn’t even try.
The title “Chief Magistrate” more properly belongs to the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, I believe. I think it’s a term of legal jurisprudence. I’m no lawyer, but that’s the way I see it.
ABC: a challenge: Read ” Rev.” Wrights biographcal Info and then read a transcript of the sermon for which he is critized. Then come back to this board and call those christians in that church listeners of raw racism. I’ll be waiting.
Pax
*APB