Posted on 06/10/2007 7:24:29 PM PDT by Reaganesque
Sally Denton uses today's Los Angeles Times op-ed page as a launching pad for the movie based on her book, "American Massacre: The Tragedy at Mountain Meadows, September 1857," and as a means to propagate more anti-Mormon bigotry at the expense of Mitt Romney. Denton insists that Romney has to respond about the nature of his faith if he expects to win the nomination for the Presidency -- and uses a lot of 19th-century examples to "prove" her case:
MITT ROMNEY'S Mormonism threatens his presidential candidacy in the same way that John F. Kennedy's Catholicism did when he ran for president in 1960. Overt and covert references to Romney's religion — subtle whispering as well as unabashed inquiries about the controversial sect he belongs to — plague his campaign. None of his responses so far have silenced the skeptics.
Recent polls indicate that from 25% to 35% of registered voters have said they would not consider voting for a Mormon for president, and conventional wisdom from the pundits suggests that Romney's biggest hurdle is his faith. Everyone seems eager to make his Mormonism an issue, from blue state secularists to red state evangelicals who view the religion as a non-Christian cult.
All of which raises the question: Are we religious bigots if we refuse to vote for a believing Mormon? Or is it perfectly sensible and responsible to be suspicious of a candidate whose creed seems outside the mainstream or tinged with fanaticism?
Ironically, Romney is the only candidate in the race (from either party) who has expressed discomfort with the idea of religion infecting the national dialogue. While his GOP rivals have been pandering to the evangelical arm of the party, Romney actually committed himself (during the first Republican debate) to the inviolable separation of church and state.
First, Denton is hardly an unbiased pundit in this regard. She's flogging a book and a movie about an atrocity committed by Mormons 150 years ago. For Denton, 1857 is relevant to 2007, but for most Americans. The suggestion that Romney needs to answer for Brigham Young would be as silly as saying that Democrats have to answer for Stephen Douglas or that Lutherans today have to answer for the anti-Semitic rants of Martin Luther.
Denton first off would have people believe that all Mormons are "tinged with fanaticism," but does nothing to advance that case. She discusses the beginnings of their church in great detail, but her history lessons appear to end at 1857. In the only mentions of any connection to the present, she uses the HBO series Big Love and Warren Jeffs, neither of which has any connection to the modern Mormon church or to Romney's faith. Both the fictional account in Big Love and the unfortunately non-fiction and despicable Jeffs involve polygamist cults -- and in the TV series, are showed as in mortal opposition to the Mormons.
Denton includes this helpful instruction at the half-way point:
It's not a church's eccentric past that makes a candidate's religion relevant today, but its contemporary doctrines. (And it's worth noting that polygamy and blood atonement, among other practices, are no longer condoned by the official Mormon church hierarchy.)
So what contemporary doctrines does Romney need to explain? Denton never says. Instead, she spends her time writing about how Joseph Smith once declared his intention to run for President -- in 1844. She discusses how John C. Fremont's candidacy died on the rumor that he was Catholic -- in 1856. She mentions 1960, in which John Kennedy dealt with anti-Catholic bigotry, but only barely notes that he prevailed over it -- and that was almost 50 years ago.
Denton then frames the question that she feels Romney has to answer:
Do you, like the prophet you follow, believe in a theocratic nation state? All the rest is pyrotechnics.
Unfortunately for Denton, Romney has answered this question every time it gets asked. And somewhat incoherently, Denton appears to forget that she herself acknowledges this near the beginning of the column:
While his GOP rivals have been pandering to the evangelical arm of the party, Romney actually committed himself (during the first Republican debate) to the inviolable separation of church and state.
Romney has no need to enter into the field of religious apologetics in his campaign for the presidency, no more than does Harry Reid in order to run the Senate. He certainly has no guilt to expiate on behalf of a massacre committed almost a century before his birth, and for people like Warren Jeffs who do not have any connection to the Mormon church. In other words, Denton has taken up space at the LA Times to exercise her bigotry and to not-so-coincidentally sell a few books and movie tickets. She and the LA Times should be ashamed.
UPDATE: One commenter suggests that people opposed Keith Ellison on the basis of his religion. Er, not quite. We opposed him on the basis of his association with the notoriously anti-Semitic group Nation of Islam and its leader, Louis Farrakhan, and his association with CAIR, which has supported terrorist groups like Hamas. If Romney had spoken at Warren Jeffs' compound for political donations, then the analogy would be apt. Ellison's problem isn't his religion but the company he keeps, politically, a fact that he and his apologists like to wrap in a false cloak of religious antagonism.
Do not post to Turret Gunner A20 again. Thank you.
Thank you.
Let’s hope it takes.
TG A20
n/p.
????
n/p = No problem ;)
OH!
Post to me a sentence with underlined, bold, italics in it ... just for the fun of it.
Hmmmm. My closing </i> didn’t work????????
I always thought it humorous that mormons consider anyone NOT a mormon to be a gentile....including Jews. Were you aware of that?
Yeah. OK. But why is your injunction not reciprocal? Why have I been gagged while the barely literate trolls and spewers of obscenities who have abused this thread, and have contributed nothing intelligent to this discussion, are allowed to continue their personal attacks?
I always thought it humorous that mormons consider anyone NOT a mormon to be a gentile....including Jews. Were you aware of that?And Christians believe that we murdered the Rabbi Jesus, a Galilean mamzer and son of peasants (the Galileans, like the Samaritans, were not accepted by the Jews as full Jews because their pedigree was uncertain) and Talmid (student) of Yochanan the Immerser (John the Baptist), even though the Gospel narratives themselves suggest that the guilt lies with the Roman administrators (Pilot, and the high priest he himself appointed: Ciaphus), and Roman clients (Herod the Idumean).
There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.To a Jew this sounds like assimilation, which is harmless enough when uttered by a protestant. Protestants at least believe in faith as a matter of conscience. So the pious Jew can simply answer: no, thank you. When a Catholic utters it this passage sounds like genocide just because of our unfortunate relationship with the Vicar of Christ and his many, many armed followers through the years.
Perhaps you hadn’t noticed that you are the only one still making insulting, condescending posts ...
Perhaps you hadn’t noticed that you are the only one still making insulting, condescending posts ...Well, then, let's get back on topic, shall we? I believe that Catholic complicity in the Shoa (Holocaust) and with every anti-semetic movement (or massacre) of the past 1000 years or more far outweighs any imagined "racism" in the source texts of the Mormon confession. Hence, not only would I vote for a Mormon before a Catholic, I would man the phone banks for, knock on doors for, and give generously to, any Mormon who had the good graces to run against a Catholic. I mean, as far as Jews are concerned, the crook and mitre are stained in Jewish blood. Besides, what better evidence of racism can there be than killing Jews? What better evidence of a pact with what a Christian would call the Devil can there be than killing Jews? And what about our aboriginal brothers and sisters who suffered and died under Church sanctioned slavery in South and Meso America? At least the Mormons not only respect, but revere our Native Americans and First Nations peoples. I mean, Yikes! As far as Christian sects go, the Mormons are among the most good and upright, wouldn't you say? The historical record at least argues as much.
Are there any Popes or Church ‘fathers’ of Christendom that you know of who rewrote the Torah and created passages to write themselves in as prophesied coming ‘in the latter days’ to restore Judaism and or Christianity? Joe Smith tried to do just that, so if there have been others befgore him, it would be an interesting study.
Are there any Popes or Church ‘fathers’ of Christendom that you know of who rewrote the Torah and created passages to write themselves in as prophesied coming ‘in the latter days’ to restore Judaism and or Christianity? Joe Smith tried to do just that, so if there have been others befgore him, it would be an interesting study.Arius, Marcion, Mani, Constantine's councils and the councils of numerous other emperors--the primitive Church was but one wave after another of rewriting the Torah, re-specifying the canon, and creating passages to write themselves in as specified. This is OK. This is what sects do. Where I draw the line is when Jews are put to the sword or to the flame. No institution in history has been more efficient, more effective, more determined, or more relentless at killing Jews than the Catholic Church.
Thanks for the information. I'll be studying the persons you mention, with an eye to seeing the rewrites in comparison to Joe Smith's rewrite of the Old Testament.
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