It matters to Christians, what Romney said. First, he looked like he was desperate to look so nice and tolerant to Christians, when the history and doctrines of his religion declare he take another stance. He declared he was a Mormon through and through. Mormonism has been written about accurately since Walter Martin’s Kingdom of the Cults. Though LDS is not necessarily a cult, it is a new and differnt religion than the one proclaimed by the followers of Jesus, first called “Christians” at Antioch. The thing invented by Joseph Smith is some kind of a spinoff of Christianity mixed in with some incredibly blasphemous theology.
Romney failed big time to me because I still see him as pandering whatever and to whomever he has to to win the White House. He’s pretty, yeah, but so is most of Hollywood’s elites. So books are certainly not represented by the cover. Buddhists are even nicer people than Mormons.
When I listened to the candidates, Mike Huckabee impressed me as the one that could lead our nation through the coming difficulties of transitioning from what president Bush’s administraion has done to the country at large and at home. Huckabee is getting slammed now, and he is still facing up to the pressure like a man, er, person, that could lead our country in the domestic and foreign domains with authority and tact.
Romney and his faith is one thing, Romney and his politics is another. Both are things I cannot yoke myself to.

I won’t be yoking myself to any religion at the polls next year, but I agree with Donny that Romney’s pandering and policies disqualify him for my vote.
“Mike Huckabee impressed me as the one that could lead our nation through the coming difficulties of transitioning from what president Bush’s administraion has done to the country at large and at home”- Donny
Brother, I know not thee.

Bigoted comments like those of your friend, David, are not a good sign …

Donny, I couldn’t agree more even though we’re coming from opposite ends of the spectrum.

It’s hard to stand back from the entire Romney and religion issue without noticing how hard evangelicals try to position Mormonism as a cult–what is a cult? A mind-bending adherence to a belief system that completely dismisses rational thought? If so–forget what Mormon doctrine is and look at Mormon behavior. Mormons lead Fortune 500 companies, are senators, are state and local leaders in most states, and one is a former governors of the most liberal, rational state in the union–Massachussettes. Positioning Mormonism as a cult is becoming empty name-calling, as Mormons are sprouting up in the ‘mainstream’ under everyone’s collective feet. Why not have a President with Romney’s track record? We might actually get something done–which will have nothing to do with religion.

Maybe Romney should be a Democrat. Harry Reid, senate majority leader, hasn’t ever had to answer to evangelicals on a witch-hunt in the Democratic Party.
Unfortunately for Republicans, their party has thrived on division and bigotry since Nixon.
When you’ve got major Republican evangelical fundamentalist fanatics like Pat Robertson & Jerry Falwell saying: ‘We deserved 911!’; and the Republican party not calling them on it – I’D RATHER HAVE MORMONS RUNNING THE GOP.
Too bad it won’t happen. Republicans aren’t the party of tolerance. They have boogymen to pull out whenever things aren’t going well in Iraq: gays, teachers, ACLU, Mormons, whistleblowers, etc.
I’ve been to Utah and currently live in Colorado. I’ve seen Mormons with Bush bumper stickers and yard signs. Maybe this is a wake-up call: “The evangelical fundamentalist majority now running the Republican party thinks you and your family are gonna burn in hell for eternity. Nationally (not in LDS leaning congressional districts), evangelical Republicans have nothing but contempt for your faith tradition.”

Maybe Romney should be a Democrat. Harry Reid, senate majority leader, hasn’t ever had to answer to evangelicals on a witch-hunt in the Democratic Party.
Unfortunately for Republicans, their party has thrived on division and bigotry since Nixon.
When you’ve got major Republican evangelical fundamentalist fanatics like Pat Robertson & Jerry Falwell saying: ‘We deserved 911!’; and the Republican party not calling them on it – I’D RATHER HAVE MORMONS RUNNING THE GOP.
Too bad it won’t happen. Republicans aren’t the party of tolerance. They have boogymen to pull out whenever things aren’t going well in Iraq: gays, teachers, ACLU, Mormons, whistleblowers, etc.
I’ve been to Utah and currently live in Colorado. I’ve seen Mormons with Bush bumper stickers and yard signs. Maybe this is a wake-up call: “The evangelical fundamentalist majority now running the Republican party thinks you and your family are gonna burn in hell for eternity. Nationally (not in LDS leaning congressional districts), evangelical Republicans have nothing but contempt for your faith tradition.”

If Romney’s goal was to state how religion shouldn’t be an issue, he did so very eloquently. His goal couldn’t have been to win over evangelicals, because he didn’t even touch on similarities or deliver any anti-cult arguments. (Maybe he assumes those espousing the cult position are a lost cause.)
I think Romney should have reminded folks that Eisenhower was raised as a Jehovah’s Witness (also seen by evangelicals as a cult), and to this day he’s still seen as a great Republican president.

Evangelical pastors will still feel the need to do sermons explaining Mormon theology because they are on a campaign to get rid of us.
Tara Tedrow, of the Orlando Sentinel, just two days ago lamented, “As an American, I’m appalled by a smear campaign that is spreading against Mitt Romney because he’s a Mormon. It’s time for it to stop.
“Some evangelicals, from California to New Hampshire, are spreading the word that it would be a sin to vote for “the Mormon” as if it’s from God’s lips to their ears.
“Mormons are open season. It’s OK to make fun of Mormon practices and temple garments, but try the same thing against Hasidic Jews and their dangling locks. You don’t see the media making fun of Catholic hats and garments, and many certainly are too scared to print cartoons of Allah and Muslims.
“But Mormons? Have at ‘em.”
And why is that? Many feel that it is because Mormonism converts more Evangelicals than any other faith, and the Evangelical pastors are worried about their dwindling pocket books.

David Brooks’s editorial column in the New York Times today is a review of the Romney speech. I’m surprised I agree with him to a substantial extent.

To Chris and Bryce- the simple fact is still that the Mormon belief system is an explicitly occultic one. True, most selfidentified conservative religion- Christian, Jewish, or Muslim- is infused with occultic behavior and marginal doctrines with its character these days, and that is internally proposed to be not just unobjectionable but good. Yet it is usually an imposed or adopted rather than inherent condition.
Yes, the political issue is one of degree, and the hypocrisy is great. Nonetheless, there is a legitimate distinction understood by theology at bottom of the current debate.
And perhaps confronting it will do everyone involved good, since this is a time in which many superficially secular belief systems have currency but also seem in ways occultisms- for example racisms, scientism, ‘supply side economics’, the Manichaeanism that calls itself ‘neoconservatism’ in foreign policy.

I’ve listened to Jack Kennedy and Mitt Romney is not even close.
Good try though, but seriously off the mark.

Christopher Hitchens on the speech: http://www.slate.com/id/2179404/
The key paragraph:
According to the admittedly very contradictory scriptures of the New Testament, Jesus of Nazareth warned his disciples and followers that they should expect to be ridiculed and mocked for their faith. After all, how likely was it that God had decided to reveal himself to only a few illiterate peasants in a barbarous backwater? Those who elected to believe this stuff were quite rightly told to expect a hard time, and the expression “fool for God” or “fool for Christ” has been with us ever since. That concept has some dignity and nobility. Entirely lacking in dignity or nobility (or average integrity) is the well-heeled son of a gold-plated church who wants to assume the pained look of martyrdom only when he is asked if he actually believes what he says. A long time ago, Romney took the decision to be a fool for Joseph Smith, a convicted fraud and serial practitioner of statutory rape who at times made war on the United States and whose cult has been made to amend itself several times in order to be considered American at all. We do not require pious lectures on the American founding from such a man, and we are still waiting for some straight answers from him.

Joe:
And Richard Nixon was raised as a Quaker …
Go figure.

Richard Nixon was member in East Whittier Friends Church, part of California Yearly Meeting of Friends.
California YM was a relatively evangelicalized Quaker group, founded by evangelical Quakers from Indiana who had adopted Protestant church forms and doctrines during the Great Revival. California YM is now renamed “Evangelical Friends Church Southwest” and doesn’t seem very distinguishable from most other evangelical groups. (Though it seems to be committed to multiethnicity.) It demands water baptism, the necessary intermediation of Christ, existence of the Devil, and End Times. Which are not Quaker beliefs/practices. As a group of congregations it severed its connections to the two non-evangelical of the three major American Quaker national groups around 1990.
For a contemporary liberal Quaker perspective on Nixon’s raising and beliefs, though a bit convoluted and compressed and with some Quaker jargon- have a look at http://www.kimopress.com/nixon.html

The GOP strategists, having worked long and hard to position themselves as the party of religion, the home of the values voters, and all that, find to their chagrin that their rank and file actually take this stuff seriously. Religion is on the verge of become a poison pill for the Republicans, the basis for name calling and finger pointing and narrow-eyed theological vetting.
Would pastors really give sermons about Mormon theology? What would be the point? It seems to me it could only increase bad feeling and social division.
It looks like instead of making Iraq more like America (probably a doomed project from the get-go), we’re on the path to making America more like Iraq. I’m pretty sure I live in the Green Zone. For you guys out in the tribal areas, best of luck!

Jillian:
Well, I didn’t claim to know all the theology (even of the mainstream Society of Friends), so thanks for the heads-up!

Mitt Romney was a non-entity to the national GOP until he discovered the power of divisive politics (re: same-sex marriage).
Now, the divisive politics that made Romney a rising star seem poised to drag him down. No one should shed a tear for Romney– he’s getting his just desserts– but it’s pitiful that even in the face of existential threats (environment, terrorism, WMD proliferation), our politics are so petty.

According to “The Teft” (you know the democrat party) there is only the enivornment to worry about. Terrorism and “WMD’s” do not exist.
Anyway, Romney’s religion of godhood, won’t go over very well in the Islamic world.
On same-sex marriage, it is the proponents and promoters of it that are the divisive and intolerant ones. Don’t blame that on people of faith. Marriage has always been a man and a woman since the founding of our secular country by men of enlightenment ideology. Why not chamge the first amendment too if we’re going to alter marriage for those that are intolerant of the status quo?

Oops!
That should have read: According to “The Left.”
Rats.

“Why not chamge the first amendment too if we’re going to alter marriage for those that are intolerant of the status quo?”
You mean for those who are intolerant of intolerance? HA!
Welcome back, Donny! I missed reading your views….

On same-sex marriage, it is the proponents and promoters of it that are the divisive and intolerant ones. Don’t blame that on people of faith. Marriage has always been a man and a woman since the founding of our secular country by men of enlightenment ideology. Why not chamge the first amendment too if we’re going to alter marriage for those that are intolerant of the status quo?
Why not reinstitute slavery too, while we’re at it?

“Anyway, Romney’s religion of godhood, won’t go over very well in the Islamic world.”
I’m been thinking this for a while and I’m surprised that this is the first time I’ve heard someone mention it. The United States is under attack by Muslim terrorists. Would having a President who believes that many gods exist cause us more problems in the war on terror? Seriously, think about it. Would it make us more of a target?

I don’t think Muslim terrorists care much about distinctions within Christianity, justathought. Anyone who is not them is a target. They even blow themselves up!

Muslim terrorists don’t care about what the leaders of the United States say or claim to believe, they care about what they are as shown in what they do.
Remember, Osama bin Laden endorsed George Bush for President in 2004. It got Bush the 2 million votes he needed to become a disaster.

There are, what, a billion Muslims? Yet not all of them are working for Osama Bin laden. Notice that their propaganda was against the “atheist” Soviet Union, and the “crusaders and jews.” Its Muslim religious recuriting propaganda. Since Mormons are polytheists, that is basically the worst religion in Muslim eyes, so I think it would boost their recuriting abilities. So I’m saying, would having a polytheist as President weaken the war on terror in making ourselves more of a target and allowing more terrorist recruitment on their side? I think it would hurt the public image of the United States throughout the world. What do you think?

Two points in response to hmm’s post:
1. correct me if I’m wrong but I think many Muslims already view Christianity as polytheistic due to the concept of the Trinity.
2. after the fiasco that is Bush, how could we possibly look any worse to anyone else in the world?