comMITTed to Romney!

The Boston Globe on Evangelicals and Mormons

“If this divergence between conservative Christians and Mormons springs from theology, another originates in the church’s early history at the margins of American society. For Mormons, says Armand Mauss, a sociologist at the Claremont Graduate University School of Religion specializing in Mormon political and social attitudes, “there is an acute awareness of their own history as a persecuted people,” a tendency “to lean on the side of freedom of expression for all different kinds of groups.”

Yeah, Christians have never been persecuting! Has the Boston Globe over heard of Nero? Has the Boston Globe ever watched Saved? Have they any idea what it is like to live as a Christian today? Teachers have a higher per-capita rate of abusing kids, but all you ever hear about is priest. Christians are constantly mocked. We both are persecuted.

“This history has translated into a respect for the constitutional separation of church and state not always popular on the religious right. John Green, a senior fellow in religion and American politics at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, describes Mormons as having “a special sensitivity to relations with the government.” While evangelical leaders like Pat Robertson and James Dobson have publicly supported the Bush administration’s funding for faith-based programs, for example, the LDS church has refused to participate in the initiative out of a fear that with government money comes government control (several conservative Christian organizations, including the Southern Baptist Convention, have taken similar positions).”

And so because Pat Robertson and James Dobson support the faith-based initiatives, every evangelical must be for them? The Mormon Church didn’t participate in them, and so every Mormon must be against them. I am a Mormon, and I love the faith based programs.

I don’t like how the welfare system took away the need for people to cultivate charity. I don’t like how it made individuals non-reliant on their neighbors, and trying to fit into the larger community. Christians need opportunities to practice christ’s love, or his teachings mean less. What better way for a church to practice Christ’s teachings than for a church to help pick up garbage, clean a park, help the homeless, help people with addiction problems, or whatever the community needs. In fact I would like a religious war, but we show our religious superiority by how much good we do in our community. I don’t know why my church is not involved in faith based initiatives. Maybe because our church members are largely consentrated in one geographic area, it is more important for our church to avoid these programs because of accusations in these regions of separate of church and state issues. And this would even make it worse. But if we were more geographically distributed, our church might participate. But who cares? Why does the Boston Globe care what Romney’s church does? Does it mater? Why not ask Romney what his views are? Well you don’t need to, he has a press release:

06-28-2005, ROMNEY VOICES SUPPORT FOR FAITH-BASED PROGRAMS

Romney has said, “The organizations and congregations represented here today have the power to lift up those around us who may have fallen on hard times. Millions in need across our nation have been touched by the positive influence of faith-based organizations. It gives me great pleasure that Ann has agreed to serve as our state’s ambassador in this compassionate effort.”

But no. Lets not read his press releases to figure out what Romney believes, lets investigate what his church has done!

In his book, TurnAround, Mitt Romney has sharp criticism for local government leaders around the 2002 winter Olympics who saw the Olympics as a pork-barrel project. Mitt Romney chose to live in Massachusetts. I don’t think he would necessarily say that people in Utah are perfect about keeping separation between church and state. I choose to live in Illinois. I think the writer of this article is giving Mormons a lot more credit than they deserve, and I think it is because he is trying to tick off evangelicals.

“For the most part — and despite evidence, recently reported by the Globe, that Romney aides had talked to LDS church leaders about creating a network of Mormon supporters for the upcoming campaign — the church is conscientious about keeping partisan politics separate from religious matters. Aside from what it sees as issues relating to “how children are raised,” says Jan Shipps, widely considered the leading non-Mormon historian of the religion, the church’s leaders tend to shy away from taking political action (doing so would, of course, also endanger the church’s nonprofit status). Polling done by BYU’s Quin Monson and Notre Dame political scientist David Campbell found that, between Catholics, Southern Baptists, and Mormons, as the two write, “Mormons are by far the least likely to receive political cues at church.”’

Oh great, another poll. Do you think we could see the data for that poll? What is a “political cues”? Who conducted the poll? Sure this is good news for the more secular of the Evangelicals, but these are the last people Romney wants to be friends with at this point, and the Globe knows it.

“Because of this insistence on separate religious and political spheres, Mormons appear less likely to wade into other culture-war debates, such as the teaching of evolution. Duane Jeffery, a BYU professor of biology and a leading opponent of teaching intelligent design in science classes, says the issue hasn’t had the same resonance for Mormons as it has for many evangelical communities — not because the LDS church is full of diehard Darwinists (the church has no official policy on the subject) but because Mormon parents, by and large, are satisfied that their children are getting their religious instruction through the often daily seminary classes the church runs for them. “In general,” he says, “most of them feel that there’s not much reason to get politically involved” over the issue.”

In general? You can’t speak in general. Here is a great defense of Intelligent Design by a great Mormon:

http://www.ornery.org/essays/warwatch/2006-01-08-1.html

He says, “Now the controversy is between advocates of the theory of Intelligent Design vs. strict Darwinists. And some people want you to think it’s the same argument. It isn’t.”

“My first exposure to Intelligent Design theory was Michael Behe’s book Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution. While disavowing any Creationist agenda per se, Behe pointed out serious problems in the strict Darwinian model of evolution…”

…The Darwinists Reply

The Darwinist answer was immediate. Unfortunately, it was also illogical, personal, and unscientific. The main points are:

1. Intelligent Design is just Creation Science in a new suit (name-calling).

2. Don’t listen to these guys, they’re not real scientists (credentialism).

3. If you actually understood science as we do, you’d realize that these guys are wrong and we’re right; but you don’t, so you have to trust us (expertism).

4. They got some details of those complex systems wrong, so they must be wrong about everything (sniping).

5. The first amendment requires the separation of church and state (politics).

6. We can’t possibly find a fossil record of every step along the way in evolution, but evolution has already been so well-demonstrated it is absurd to challenge it in the details (prestidigitation).

7. Even if there are problems with the Darwinian model, there’s no justification for postulating an “intelligent designer” (true).

Let’s take these points in turn:

1. You have to be ignorant of either Creation Science or Intelligent Design — or both — to think that they’re the same thing. Creation Science is embarrassing and laughable — its authors either don’t understand science or are deliberately deceiving readers who don’t understand it. Frankly, Creation Science is, in my opinion, a pack of pious lies.

But the problems that the Designists raise with the Darwinian model are, in fact, problems. They do understand the real science, and the Darwinian model is, in fact, inadequate to explain how complex systems, which fail without all elements in place, could arise through random mutation and natural selection.

If Darwinists persist in trying to tar the Designists with the Creation-Science brush, then it is bound to appear, to anyone who has actually examined both, that the Darwinists are trying to deceive us. (They’re apparently counting on most people to not care enough to discover the difference.)

Click here, to read the rest.

http://www.ornery.org/essays/warwatch/2006-01-08-1.html

I imagine most Mormons would defend intelligent design, and probably more of them would defend it if they read the above article. In fact I don’t see how anyone would have a problem with intelligent design. Also, mormons do not have a daily seminary class, just the high school students, and attendance rates are not that great.

“On the issue of school prayer, which conservative evangelicals overwhelmingly favor, Mormons are divided. In Utah, according to the pollster Dan Jones, most Mormons support it. Polling numbers outside of Utah are harder to come by, but some political scientists and sociologists of the church argue that Mormons living elsewhere see school prayer as a threat.”

Let me assure you that we do not view hearing other people pray as a threat. I feel uncomfortable because of what Christ said about the matter. He said

http://scriptures.lds.org/en/matt/6/5-6#5

5 And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the ahypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets (and in the football stadium), that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.

6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy acloset, and when thou hast bshut thy door, cpray to thy Father which is in dsecret; and thy Father which eseeth in secret shall freward thee openly.

The scriptures also say the following:

http://scriptures.lds.org/en/matt/5/16#16

16 Let your alight so shine before men, that they may see your good bworks, and cglorify your Father which is in heaven.

So when people pray in public, especially outside of church, I don’t know if they are hypocrites who pray to be seen of men, and want the glory for themsleves, or if they are trying to let their light shine to bring glory to God. When people pray in at a football stadium I usually assume they are hypocrites, and I feel uncomfortable because I think they are making an ass out of themselves, but let me assure you. We are not “threatened” when we hear others pray. We just feel bad for them.

“Two-thirds of American Mormons live outside the Mormon strongholds of the Western mountain states, and as BYU political scientist Richard Davis puts it, “There’s a little more uneasiness about it because of the realization that they’re a minority.” The 2000 Supreme Court case Santa Fe Independent School District v. Doe, which outlawed student-led prayers before football games, was brought by a Mormon family in Texas.”

Great, that is going to make evangelicals really happy. Thanks Globe! The fact is every Mormon did not make that call to the ACLU. Most Mormons hate the ACLU just as much as evangelicals. So don’t let the Globe paint us as some ACLU loving hippies. Just google ACLU and Mormon. Find the truth for yourself.

“That is not to say that the church refrains from telling its members what sort of life to lead (devout Mormons cannot drink alcohol, smoke, or have caffeine), but it often allows them the freedom to make decisions that other conservative churches would balk at.

The caffeine thing is a persistent rumor, but it is not true. I was a Mormon missionary for two years in Tennessee, and 95% of my co-workers all drank coke. But 95% of them were also guilty of thanksgiving-esque gluttony any time free food was offer them too, so what does that tell you?” Maybe nothing, but the church has no official policy on caffeine. Just believe me ok. OK, that’s one rumor taken care of.

“During the heated debate over the fate of Terri Schiavo, for example, the Mormon church reiterated its position that, “Members should not feel obligated to extend mortal life by means that are unreasonable.”’

How exactly did the church reiterate this? Shouldn’t they have to put footnes or something? I have never heard this policy, and I go almost every week. Does the Globe just make this stuff up?

“There are fewer fixed dos and don’ts” for Mormons, says Sherlock. On end-of-life issues, he says, “the Mormon Church says, ‘Think about it, pray about it, and get the best answer you can.”‘

Not accordinig to anti-Mormons. They think we think we have to work our way into heaven. They don’t think we believe in Christ’s Grace. They will always tell you that they are saved, and rub it in your face that they can just kick back knowing that they are saved. The first thing a born-again evangelical will ask you is if you are saved. They will tell you the date of when they are saved. It is obvious that the writer of this article for the Globe has never met an evangelical. When I served a mission for my church in Tennessee, I met about 100 a day, and I heard about 200 experiences a day outlining down to the very minuite the details of when each person was saved. At the end of their story, they ask if you are saved, and when you don’t say yes right a way, they rub it in all the things you have to do. They tell you all the lists of commandments that Mormons have to keep. Don’t do this, don’t do that, they say. I’m already saved, I can do whatever I want! Just joking, but it is obvious that the writer has never met an evangelical.

“It’s this idea that Romney himself seemed to refer to in a 1994 interview with the Boston-based gay and lesbian newspaper Bay Windows, in which he rooted what was then his strong support for gay rights in his religion. Drawing on the Mormon concept of “free agency” — the idea that, despite God’s foreknowledge of what we will do, we are still free to choose our actions — he made a political argument about the value of tolerance. “Our society should allow people to make their own choices and live by their own beliefs,” he argued.”

“Since those comments resurfaced a few weeks ago, Romney has been pressed to reconcile them with his now strident opposition to same-sex marriage. On that issue, Romney’s newly assertive conservatism places him in step with his church. On others, though, he seems more a conservative evangelical than a Mormon.”

Once again I say it. How can Romney be in step politically with a church that does not have political positions? Once again all evangelicals are not involved in the faith-based initiatives, or think that life starts at exactly the same time. Romney’s opposition to same sex marriage is not new.

If you just read this article:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitt_Romney#Same-sex_marriage

…you will read this; “When he ran for governor in 2002, Romney declared his opposition to both same-sex marriage and civil unions.[69] “Call me old fashioned, but I don’t support gay marriage nor do I support civil union,” said Romney in an October 2002 gubernatorial debate. He also voiced support for basic domestic partnership benefits for gay couples.”

“To read a newspaper is to refrain from reading something worthwhile. The first discipline of education must therefore be to refuse resolutely to feed the mind with canned chatter”.
Aleister Crowley

This is especially true of the Boston Globe. It is even worse than the internet.

~ Mike

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