Mitt's Bad Faith

Is it fair to vote against a candidate based on his or her religious beliefs? Why not? Tolerance is one thing. Endorsement is quite another. As no lesser a sage than George Carlin has pointed out, one's religious beliefs are strictly voluntary. Unlike your race, ethnicity or gender, it's you who chooses what to believe or not.

Now that Mitt Romney has introduced his religion into the center of the political arena, I think we have every right to evaluate him, in part, on precisely those beliefs. No surprise that Mitt -- who has was pro-choice before he was anti-choice, who was tolerant of gays and immigrants before turning nativist and homophobe -- would now want it both ways when it comes to his Mormonism.

First he said this: "Let me assure you that no authorities of my church, or of any other church for that matter, will ever exert influence on presidential decisions. Their authority is theirs, within the province of church affairs, and it ends where the affairs of the nation begin."

Then he said that: "I believe in my Mormon faith and I endeavor to live by it. My faith is the faith of my fathers - I will be true to them and to my beliefs."

That said, should I care just exactly what those Mormon beliefs are?

Damn straight I should. And I do. Mormon beliefs could have a profound effect on vast swaths of public policy as the religion reporter of The Dallas Morning News pointed out earlier this year. Mormon doctrine holds that the constitution of the United States was divinely inspired; that welfare undermines the higher value of self-sufficiency; that traditional families must be strengthened and that women should be those primarily responsible for child-rearing; that abortion, with some exceptions should be banned, and that each person has an inherent gender that pre-existed in a life before birth and that each of these identities can never be gay.

Worse, Mormons subscribe to the notion of so-called "continuing revelation" which, boiled down, means that a practicing member of the church can have a dramatic epiphany at any moment that would alter the basic dogma. That's what supposedly happened thirty years ago when official church policy was altered to allow blacks full membership in the Latter Days Saints.

That's to say, it wasn't until 1978 that Mormons processed the "revelation" that people with dark skin might really be, um, people. What revelation might a President Romney have some afternoon while doodling in the West Wing?

Mitt Romney's free to be a Mormon and free to run as a religiously-inspired candidate. And I'm just as free to reject him for his religious beliefs as I am for his positions on the war, taxes and torture. Now, that's real tolerance.

Comments

[waiguoren]

Doesn't anyone copyedit these posts at all?

"that abortions, with some exceptions..."

That abortions, with some exceptions...WHAT?

[hopeless277]

Ah, the magic of invisible friends who have the power to control each and every detail of life. It is comforting to be able to say 'god's will' when something bad happens. Or praise god when good things happen. It can also be terrifying to realize that this planet is a speck of dust on the carpet of the cosmos and that we are as insignificant in this cosmos as said dust is in our own homes. Superstition is very hard to break. It was only 500 years ago that the Earth was flat. Will I not vote for Willard because he's a Mormon? No. I will not vote for Willard because he's a Republican. And if there was a Satan, he would be a Republican.

[swampthing]

As a non-Mormon who grew up in rural Utah, I can tell you this: it is extremely rare for a Mormon to behave hatefully toward anybody who is not part of their religion, and that is because their theology barely gives them any reason to. You will NEVER see them picketing at the funerals of soldiers saying God killed them 'cause America is too kind to gay people.
Every candidate's religion deserves to be dragged out onto the floor and battered with logic and critical questions, which will of course expose the superstitious irrationality, hatred and violence behind Baptists, Pentecostals and the like as the candidates that Americans voters should be shunning.
Want to know why European countries score higher than us for happiness and progress? It's because religious insanity doesn't play much of a role.

[RoddyMcCorley]

Shorter Mitt Romney: "It's okay to be intolerant, just not of me."

[DenverCurmudgeon]

The core belief of the mormon religion is the allegation that resurrected Jesus came to North America in the 7th century to find and preach to two tribes of Jews. Edited from Wikipedia:

"According to The Book of Mormon, the family of Lehiand Zoram traveled from the Middle East circa 600 B.C. to the Americas by boat. Nephi (Lehi"s fourth son) overheard that his brothers were plotting to kill him, so Nephi and his followers left and went into the wilderness. The followers of Nephi called themselves Nephites. The followers of Laman (Lehi"s oldest son) were called Lamanites.

Following the American visitation of the resurrected Jesus Christ the Nephites became the Mormons because they accepted the teachings of Jesus. However the Lamanites rejected Jesus so God marked the Lamanites with a darker skin color to identify them and their state of wickedness."

No one has discoved any creditable DNA or archeolgical evidence to substantiate any of part of this story.

America is living through a nightmare because the current administration takes foreign policy advice from people with fringe religious beliefs. Enough is enough.

[MinuteMan]

Romney: We must continue the practice of religious intolerance in this country but please, please, please consider me to be on your side: religious bigotry is very bad if you are on the receiving end!

[Chris]

So what Mr. Cooper you beleive that the constitution is wrong and there should be a religous test to hold office?

[Crowhaul]

"one's religious beliefs are strictly voluntary" Excellent point. I was watching Chris Matthews yesterday as he was discussing the Romney speech, and was astounded when he said 'After all, Mitt didn't choose his faith'. Huh??! As others have said, just what the hell was Chris smoking yesterday??

If Mitt didn't CHOOSE his faith are we to believe it was somehow forced upon him? Was he an unwilling victim of advanced Mormon brainwashing techniques? Here's the bottom line, Chris Matthews: ALL ADULTS CHOOSE THEIR FAITH AND ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR CHOICE.

[OETKB]

It is precisely Mr. Romney's conundrum when he brings religion into the public square that those who founded this country, after much debate, wanted to avoid. A nation can not govern itself on beliefs of any group but rather must be absolutely secular in its deliberations. This actually protects religions because it is then known that religion is not open to governmental scrutiny. By leaving it out of government one is free to practice in whatever manner they choose, within the law of course, and maintain their beliefs without interference, no matter how principled or unprincipled they are. We do get some pretty odd creeds this way, but our Constitution says each to their own only, not to the rest of the nation.

[elkabong]

P.S. There seems to be something missing in the passage below. Typo?

"for child-rearing; that abortion, with some exceptions, and that each person has an inherent gender"

[elkabong]

What's the deal with the magic underpants?
What do they do and where do I get some?

[Mormondude]

You're not entirely correct on your little hatchet job.

First of all, the LDS church has its own 'welfare' program. The difference is that it's designed to encourage self-sufficiency rather than undermine it. Everything about the program is focused on making assistance a temporary transition rather than a lifestyle.

If you want more details, you can read all about it here.

http://www.providentliving.org/

[Camel54]

Amen. And I believe the Republicans to be responsible for all this relgious litmus testing of candidates anyway so they need to reap the rewards of what they have built and be judged by the same insane standards they have pushed to judge others. In addition, to me it doesn't matter what version of nonsense a person believes in. Is Mormonism more ridiculous than your Classic Christ? To the casual observer, yes, and he should be mocked for standing by something so patently laughable. But then isn't it just as laughable for someone to say they believe in Genesis as absolutely true, that the world is 6000 years old? Of all the reasons I would never support Mitt, his religion is nowhere to be found. The completely stupid utterances on the subject, though, different story.