Mormonism and Mitt Romney’s “Weirdness”

New York Times ^ | Aug. 9, 2011 | Ross Douthat

[Colofornian]

...we pretty much know what kind of re-election campaign Barack Obama is going to wage: A relentlessly negative one, which...will focus almost exclusively on making the challenger seem unacceptable rather than defending the sitting president’s accomplishments. Thanks to Ben Smith at Politico, we also know roughly how the White House plans to “destroy Mitt Romney,”...By “attacking him as inauthentic, unprincipled and, in a word used repeatedly by Obama’s advisers in about a dozen interviews, ‘weird.’”

Weird how, you ask? Here’s Smith:

The character attacks on Romney will focus on what critics view as a makeover, both personal (skinny jeans) and political (abortion) … Democrats also plan to amplify what Obama strategists described as the “weirdness” quotient, the sum of awkward public encounters and famous off-kilter anecdotes, first among them the tale of Romney having strapped his dog to the roof of his car.

SNIP

...The crucial thing to understand here is that Romney’s Latter Day Saint affiliation isn’t just a potential liability among evangelical voters in Republican primaries. It’s a potential general election liability as well. In a recent Gallup poll, 18 percent of Republicans described themselves as unwilling to vote for a Mormon candidate — but that number actually climbed to 19 percent among Independents, and 27 percent among Democrats.

Who are these non-conservative Mormon skeptics?... theologically conservative/politically liberal Christians (mainly African American and Hispanic) who regard Mormonism as a dangerous heresy...secular liberals...who dislike L.D.S...positions...people who don’t have a particular theological or political ax to grind, who know Mormonism primarily through pop culture (from “Big Love” and “Sister Wives” to “South Park” and “The Book of Mormon”) and the occasional encounter with bicycling missionaries, and who have a vague sense of the L.D.S. church as little bit cultish, a little bit outside-the-mainstream, and a little bit, well, weird...

[Colofornian]

From the article: The character attacks on Romney will focus on what critics view as a makeover, both personal (skinny jeans) and political (abortion) … Democrats also plan to amplify what Obama strategists described as the “weirdness” quotient, the sum of awkward public encounters and famous off-kilter anecdotes, first among them the tale of Romney having strapped his dog to the roof of his car.

Weird. Except the supposed abortion "makeover." That's just bloody slimy.

[nuconvert]

Weird? Like Obama isn’t? LoL.

[mkmensinger]

Exactly. I don’t think Obama wants to go there, to open that door.

[DaxtonBrown]

[Funny, the people who go after LDS as heresy (which I think it is) don’t seem to have a problem with black liberation theology?]

You are full of crap. I can send you numerous chapters from three books I’ve written that go into liberation theology with nary a mention of Mormonism. It is just that I don’t see much chance that Allen West, or Herman Cain, or Thomas Sowell or Clarence Thomas et. al. are ever going to be into Mormonism or Black Liberation Theology. So you sir are full of it. I guarantee no one on Free Republic would support someone into Black Liberation Theology.

[fulltlt]

Heard Sean Hannity interview Willard last night. Hannity referred to Romney as the Republican front runner. Based on what????

Romney said Obama should apologize for Obamacare. I wanted to yell at the TV and ask him where he got the idea from.

Romney will never get my vote no matter what.

[Caipirabob]

Why the hell are we letting the liberals persecute a fellow American for a religion that has played a key, no pivotal role in the history and foundation of our nation?!?

To HELL with the New York Times and their NAZI BLOGGERS...

[Caipirabob]

Romney will never get my vote no matter what.

Mine, neither! Still, he's free to worship God in this country and I won't let the democrats set their Nazi thugs to persecute him or anyone else.

[parksstp]

? I’m sorry, I think you’ve misinterpreted my comment to mean something it didn’t. I was referring to this:

“Who are these non-conservative Mormon skeptics?... theologically conservative/politically liberal Christians (mainly African American and Hispanic) who regard Mormonism as a dangerous heresy...secular liberals...who dislike L.D.S...positions”

I was thinking along people such as Rev. Wright and other Black Liberation theologists who think there’s nothing wrong with the hate message they preach, but apparentally will be the first to jump out and accuse mormonism of heresy, which I find ironic.

In no way did I mean to apply any references to conservatives such as West, Sowell, Thomas, etc. The paragraph I cited referred to non-conservatives. Sorry for the confusion.

[Colofornian]

Why the hell are we letting the liberals persecute a fellow American for a religion that has played a key, no pivotal role in the history and foundation of our nation?!?

Did you know it's Mormon "doctrine" to regard all of the Christian founding fathers of our country as members of "apostate" churches?

Joseph Smith's original vision -- later made into Mormon "scripture" -- Pearl of Great Price, Joseph Smith History, vv. 18-20...labels the believers of Christian sects in the 1820s as ALL "corrupt" as professing believers.

Smith said they believed 100% abominable creeds.

Mormon doctrine is that the Christian church apostatized off the face of the earth. Given that Muslims label Christians as "infidels," isn't much difference in Islam's doctrine of Christianity vs. the Lds church's...is there now?

[Elsie]

...the people who go after LDS as heresy (which I think it is) don’t seem to have a problem with black liberation theology?

HMMMmmm...

I hadn't noticed.

Perhaps you could give some examples.

[Elsie]

...persecute a fellow American...

What?

[Elsie]

Still, he's free to worship God in this country and I won't let the democrats set their Nazi thugs to persecute him or anyone else.

Last time I looked; payback is STILL a bitch!

---

 

---

Questions put to Joseph Smith: "'Do you believe the Bible?' [Smith:]'If we do, we are the only people under heaven that does, for there are none of the religious sects of the day that do'. When asked 'Will everybody be damned, but Mormons'? [Smith replied] 'Yes, and a great portion of them, unless they repent, and work righteousness." (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 119).

Joseph Smith: "for the teachers of religion of the different sects understood the same passages of scripture so differently as to destroy all confidence in settling the question by an appeal to the Bible" (from Pearl of Great Price 1:12). "What is it that inspires professors of Christianity generally with a hope of salvation? It is that smooth, sophisticated influence of the devil, by which he deceives the whole world" (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p.270).

 

 

Brigham Young stated this repeatedly: "When the light came to me I saw that all the so-called Christian world was grovelling in darkness" (Journal of Discourses  5:73); "The Christian world, so-called, are heathens as to the knowledge of the salvation of God" (Journal of Discourses  8:171); "With a regard to true theology, a more ignorant people never lived than the present so-called Christian world" (Journal of Discourses  8:199); "And who is there that acknowledges [God's] hand? ...You may wander east, west, north, and south, and you cannot find it in any church or government on the earth, except the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints" (Journal of Discourses , vol. 6, p.24); "Should you ask why we differ from other Christians, as they are called, it is simply because they are not Christians as the New Testament defines Christianity" (Journal of Discourses  10:230).

Orson Pratt proclaimed: "Both Catholics and Protestants are nothing less than the 'whore of Babylon' whom the Lord denounces by the mouth of John the Revelator as having corrupted all the earth by their fornications and wickedness. Any person who shall be so corrupt as to receive a holy ordinance of the Gospel from the ministers of any of these apostate churches will be sent down to hell with them, unless they repent" (The Seer, p. 255).

 

 

Pratt also said: "This great apostasy commenced about the close of the first century of the Christian era, and it has been waxing worse and worse from then until now" (Journal of Discourses , vol.18, p.44) and: "But as there has been no Christian Church on the earth for a great many centuries past, until the present century, the people have lost sight of the pattern that God has given according to which the Christian Church should be established, and they have denominated a great variety of people Christian Churches, because they profess to be ...But there has been a long apostasy, during which the nations have been cursed with apostate churches in great abundance" (Journal of Discourses , 18:172).

 

President John Taylor stated: "Christianity...is a perfect pack of nonsense...the devil could not invent a better engine to spread his work than the Christianity of the nineteenth century." (Journal of Discourses , vol. 6, p.167); "Where shall we look for the true order or authority of God? It cannot be found in any nation of Christendom." (Journal of Discourses , 10:127).

James Talmage said: "A self-suggesting interpretation of history indicates that there has been a great departure from the way of salvation as laid down by the Savior, a universal apostasy from the Church of Christ". (A Study of the Articles of Faith, p.182).

 

 

President Joseph Fielding Smith said: "Doctrines were corrupted, authority lost, and a false order of religion took the place of the gospel of Jesus Christ, just as it had been the case in former dispensations, and the people were left in spiritual darkness." (Doctrines of Salvation, p.266). "For hundreds of years the world was wrapped in a veil of spiritual darkness, until there was not one fundamental truth belonging to the place of salvation ...Joseph Smith declared that in the year 1820 the Lord revealed to him that all the 'Christian' churches were in error, teaching for commandments the doctrines of men" (Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 3, p.282).

 

 

More recent statements by apostle Bruce McConkie are also very clear: "Apostasy was universal...And this darkness still prevails except among those who have come to a knowledge of the restored gospel" (Doctrines of Salvation, vol 3, p.265); "Thus the signs of the times include the prevailing apostate darkness in the sects of Christendom and in the religious world in general" (The Millennial Messiah, p.403); "a perverted Christianity holds sway among the so-called Christians of apostate Christendom" (Mormon Doctrine, p.132); "virtually all the millions of apostate Christendom have abased themselves before the mythical throne of a mythical Christ whom they vainly suppose to be a spirit essence who is incorporeal uncreated, immaterial and three-in-one with the Father and Holy Spirit" (Mormon Doctrine, p.269); "Gnosticism is one of the great pagan philosophies which antedated Christ and the Christian Era and which was later commingled with pure Christianity to form the apostate religion that has prevailed in the world since the early days of that era." (Mormon Doctrine, p.316).

President George Q. Cannon said: "After the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized, there were only two churches upon the earth. They were known respectively as the Church of the Lamb of God and Babylon. The various organizations which are called churches throughout Christendom, though differing in their creeds and organizations, have one common origin. They all belong to Babylon" (Gospel Truth, p.324).

 

 

President Wilford Woodruff stated: "the Gospel of modern Christendom shuts up the Lord, and stops all communication with Him. I want nothing to do with such a Gospel, I would rather prefer the Gospel of the dark ages, so called" (Journal of Discourses , vol. 2, p.196).

[ETL]

Obama's "weird" Black Liberation Theology...

"Black theology will accept only the love of God which participates in the destruction of the white enemy. What we need is the divine love as expressed in Black Power, which is the power of black people to destroy their oppressors here and now by any means at their disposal".--James (Jim) Cone,
African American Religious Thought: An Anthology (Paperback)
by Cornel West (Editor), Eddie S. Glaude Jr. (Editor)
____________________________________________

SEAN HANNITY: But Reverend Jeremiah Wright is not backing down and has not for years and in his strong stance on the teaching of black liberation theology is nothing new. He had the same things to say last spring when he appeared on "Hannity & Colmes:"

WRIGHT: If you're not going to talk about theology in context, if you're not going to talk about liberation theology that came out of the '60s, systematized black liberation theology that started with Jim Cone in 1968 and the writings of Cone and the writings of Dwight Hopkins and the writings of womynist theologians and Asian theologians and Hispanic theologians, then you can't talk about the black value system.

HANNITY: But I'm a — reverend

WRIGHT: Do you know liberation theology, sir?

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,354158,00.html
____________________________________________

Obama's Church: Gospel of Hate
Kathy Shaidle, FrontPageMag.com
Monday, April 07, 2008

In March of 2007, FOX News host Sean Hannity had engaged Obama’s pastor in a heated interview about his Church’s teachings. For many viewers, the ensuing shouting match was their first exposure to "Black Liberation Theology"...

Like the pro-communist Liberation Theology that swept Central America in the 1980s and was repeatedly condemned by Pope John Paul II, Black Liberation Theology combines warmed-over 1960s vintage Marxism with carefully distorted biblical passages. However, in contrast to traditional Marxism, it emphasizes race rather than class. The Christian notion of "salvation" in the afterlife is superseded by "liberation" on earth, courtesy of the establishment of a socialist utopia.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=30CD9E14-B0C9-4F8C-A0A6-A896F0F44F02
____________________________________________

Catholics for Marx [Liberation Theology]
By Fr. Robert Sirico
FrontPageMagazine.com | Thursday, June 03, 2004

In the days when the Superpowers were locked in a Cold War, Latin America seethed with revolution, and millions lived behind an iron curtain, a group of theologians concocted a novel idea within the history of Christianity. They proposed to combine the teachings of Jesus with the teachings of Marx as a way of justifying violent revolution to overthrow the economics of capitalism.

The Gospels were re-rendered not as doctrine impacting on the human soul but rather as windows into the historical dialectic of class struggle. These "liberation theologians" saw every biblical criticism of the rich as a mandate to expropriate the expropriating owners of capital, and every expression of compassion for the poor as a call for an uprising by the proletarian class of peasants and workers.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=460782B7-35CC-4C9E-A2C5-93832067C7CD
____________________________________________

"Their founding document [the Weather Underground's] called for the establishment of a "white fighting force" to be allied with the "Black Liberation Movement" and other "anti-colonial" movements[1] to achieve "the destruction of US imperialism and the achievement of a classless world: world communism."..."-Berger, Dan (2006). Outlaws of America: The Weather Underground and the Politics of Solidarity. AK Press, 95.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weatherman_Underground#cite_ref-Berger_0-0

Outlaws of America: The Weather Underground and the Politics of Solidarity (Paperback) by Dan Berger
http://www.amazon.com/Outlaws-America-Underground-Politics-Solidarity/dp/1904859410
____________________________________________

From the New York Times, August 24, 2003

"they [the Weather Underground] employed revolutionary jargon, advocated armed struggle and black liberation and began bombing buildings, taking responsibility for at least 20 attacks. Estimates of their number ranged at times from several dozen to several hundred."

Article: Quieter Lives for 60's Militants, but Intensity of Beliefs Hasn't Faded
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F04E4DE1539F937A1575BC0A9659C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=2
____________________________________________

Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright and Dr. William Ayers
are greeted by Rebekah Levin with the Committee
for a Just Peace in Israel and Palestine.
(Chuck Berman/Chicago Tribune / May 17, 2009)
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-ayers_wrightmay18,0,6689521.story

[reaganaut]

Funny, the people who go after LDS as heresy (which I think it is) don’t seem to have a problem with black liberation theology? Interesting.

- - - - -
Hogwash. I have issues with both.

The difference for me is, while I have read books on Black liberation theology, I LIVED Mormonism.

[reaganaut]

Why the hell are we letting the liberals persecute a fellow American for a religion that has played a key, no pivotal role in the history and foundation of our nation?!?

- - - - - -

WTH???? This country was founded LONG before Smith came up with his folk tale the Book of Mormon.

Mormons had NOTHING NOTHING to do with the foundation of this nation, and even took oaths against AMERICA (I can source it if you want).

Now, if this article were attacking Puritans, Deists, Catholics, Methodists or some other religions THAT WAS IN EXISTENCE at the founding of this country, we can talk.

Mormonism is a cult. Period.

[ETL]

the people who go after LDS as heresy (which I think it is) don’t seem to have a problem with black liberation theology?

The Real Story Behind Rev. Wright's Controversial Black Liberation Theology Doctrine
Monday , May 5, 2008
FoxNews/Hannity's America
[special Friday night edition--original airdate May 2, 2008]

(some key excerpts)

["(Jose) Diaz-Balart is the son of Rafael Diaz-Balart y Guitierrez (a former Cuban politician). He has three bothers, Rafael Diaz-Balart (a banker), Mario Diaz-Balart (a US Congressman) and Lincoln Diaz-Balart (also a US Congressman). His aunt, Mirta Diaz-Balart, was Fidel Castro's first wife."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jose_Diaz-Balart]

JOSE DIAZ-BALART, TELEMUNDO NETWORK: "Liberation theology in Nicaragua in the mid-1980's was a pro-Sandinista, pro-Marxist, anti-U.S., anti-Catholic Church movement. That's it. No ifs, ands, or buts. His church apparently supported, in the mid-'80s in Nicaragua, groups that supported the Sandinista dictatorships and that were opposed to the Contras whose reason for being was calling for elections. That's all I know. I was there.

I saw the churches in Nicaragua that he spoke of, and the churches were churches that talked about the need for violent revolution and I remember clearly one of the major churches in Managua where the Jesus Christ on the altar was not Jesus Christ, he was a Sandinista soldier, and the priests talked about the corruption of the West, talked about the need for revolution everywhere, and talked about 'the evil empire' which was the United States of America."

REV. BOB SCHENCK, NATIONAL CLERGY COUNCIL: "it's based in Marxism. At the core of his [Wright's] theology is really an anti-Christian understanding of God, and as part of a long history of individuals who actually advocate using violence in overthrowing those they perceive to be oppressing them, even acts of murder have been defended by followers of liberation theology. That's very, very dangerous."

SCHENCK: "I was actually the only person escorted to Dr. Wright. He asked to see me, and I simply welcomed him to Washington, and then I said Dr. Wright, I want to bring you a warning: your embrace of Marxist liberation theology. It is contrary to the Gospel, and you need, sir, to abandon it. And at that he dropped the handshake and made it clear that he was not in the mood to dialogue on that point."

Source: The Real Story Behind Rev. Wright's Controversial Black Liberation Theology Doctrine:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,354158,00.html

[Utah Binger]

Why the hell are we letting the liberals persecute a fellow American for a religion that has played a key, no pivotal role in the history and foundation of our nation?!?

I would like to hear a few things to describe what exactly Mormonism has done in a pivotal way for the history and foundation of our nation. Sure, they settled on free land in the west as a place to hide once again as they ran from the law. Pivotal? Please.

[tarotsailor]

To a person raised in that cult being a Mormon is a full time job. It’s not uncommon for a person to spend 40hrs a week either in church, at church activities, or working for the church. Children are hauled out of bed at 4am to attend Mormon classes before going to eight hours of school, then afterschool sent to church youth activities that keep them off the streets and prevents them from interacting with non-mormon kids...they’re encouaged to invite them to church, however. A typical mormon Sunday worship begins at 6am for priesthood meetings, (indoctrination) classes until 8, worship for two hours, then two hours for more classes, break for lunch, and then Sabbath meetings until 6pm. There is no offering plate, at tax time you bring your 1040’s to the bishop, he calculates 10% of your income and you pay up. If you’r a male teenager you are expected to work odd jobs to save for your “mission”, where the church sends you to whatever part of the planet they choose for you to convert new mormons for two years and the teenager must pay for it all himself.

To put the frosting on the cake, every little mormon believes they are preparing to become a god and create universes of their own, or a wife to a god (being divine is an all-males club) and as a wife to a god you are eternally “spiritually pregnant” making souls to populate worlds while hubby god is off making them. If a man is behind in his mormon o
bligations, he goes to heaven, but he has to live in the “slum areas” of heaven
If a mormon female dies unmarried to a future god, she simply goes to hell. Along with the entire population of non-mormons on planet earth, I might add.

The pressure of being a future god takes its toll. Young mormons often have mental issues and high rates of suicide if they truly believe, because there is no redemption for sin in the Mormon church, Christ serves as an example of a perfect man, not a divine deliverer. “be ye perfect as I am perfect” is a phrase drilled into your head with machine gun repetition. Older momons become jaded and often the aim is to look as perfect as possible to other momons to “keep up with the Jones’” and to maintaintheir positions and responsibilities in the church, which often confer earthly advantages.
mormons work for mormons, rent from mormons, buy their goods from mormon businesses.

In short, you average devoted mormon is a person from a closed off culture who believes it’s a survival issue to be perfect, or seem so, and is eternally insecure without the Linus blanket of the church wrapped around them, and their final loyalty is to the president of the church, who is the god who mediates between the earthly gods and “the” God, who after all also was a man on another planet who also followed this insane cult to become a god.

I was raised in the church, and before you believe a word out of a mormon’s mouth, I must relate one of the first things the church teaches you is that “its a greater sin to lose a convert than to lie about a church belief that might offend them and turn them away”, hence the millions of dollars spent on commercials and missionaries sent all over the globe to chant the mantra “we’re just regular Christians like you”. They’re not.

Try googling “ ex-mormon” sometime and see the incredible human damage that lies in the wake of this cult. The survivors of this pseudo-spiritual empire are not the “anti-mormon conspiracy” trolling mormon apologists invect ad nauseum on these forums. They are victims.

[Redmen4ever]

Members of strange or unusual churches need to make clear their position on the relationship of church and state: If they believe in a secular state that upholds religious freedom, what’s the problem? If they believe that the state should legislate morality, then there’s a big problem.

As a rule, Democrats, believing as they do in “social justice,” spill their religious beliefs into government. Republicans are confusing. Some would have the government attempt to implement a social conservative agenda, while others would have the government stay out of people’s private lives. We might suppose that Romney, who is a moderate on social issues, is the latter (a “live and let live” kind of guy). But, it is still necessary for him to address the issue. It is even a good opportunity to speak to the principle of limited government, in economic matters as well as personal matters.

As for one church condemning another, yes, the Mormons describe all Christians as apostate. That is a problem for Romney. Does he agree with this teaching of the Mormon Church? Even if he is a live and let live kind of guy, it is still creepy to think any person in the position of President of the United States thinks the majority of Americans are apostates. Can Romney say that the Mormon Church creeps him out with this doctrine? Can he ask the President of the Mormon Church to get a Word of Knowledge, even to ask all the people of the United States to pray for this, so Mormons can join in communion with Christians?

There is also the racial issue. He has spoken to this in the past, saying that when he was a boy or a young man (I don’t recall how he characterized his age), his family was thankful that the special limitations for black people were lifted by the President of the Mormon Church. O.K., but does expressing this recollection go far enough? Did he think the Mormon Church was wrong in its limitations on black people? Or, did he and does he think that black people used to be inferior to white people? Again, it would creep me out to think that the President of the United States was raised in a church that taught that any race was superior or inferior to another. The Protestant denominations that used to teach such things have apologized for this sin. Maybe the Mormons have. Mitt will have to tell us about this.

Finally, I will mention the polygamy issue. The Mormons used to allow polygamy and, then, after exhausting their appeals to the courts of this country when the Congress passed a law against it, they came down against it for practical reasons, so Mormons could live peacefully in this country. Some Mormons relocated out of the country, so as not to break up their polygamous families. Among these was Romney’s paternal lineage. Romney’s father was born in Mexico and never naturalized upon entry into this country. In my opinion, Mitt is an anchor baby and according to the strictest interpretation of “natural born,” is not qualified to be President. He would also be the first Hispanic President. All that to the side, what’s his position on polygamy?

Was the Supreme Court correct to uphold a Congressional law banning polygamy, where - in the U.S. Constitution - does the Congress get this power? And, how can the government discriminate between polygamous marriages and other forms of marriage? In the famous Texas sodomy case, the U.S. Supreme Court said that the State had no interest in homosexuality; and, Justice Scalia, in his opinion, asks what, then, is the State’s interest in incest, polygamy, and so forth?

Normally, candidates for President aren’t asked about polygamy. But, Mitt, by reason of being the grandchild of a polygamous family that relocated to Mexico rather than conform to the laws of this country, will have to address this issue.