Posted on 01/17/2012 10:08:09 PM PST by ynotjjr
As Mitt Romney spends the next leg of his campaign courting evangelical voters in South Carolina, his Mormon faith is expected to re-emerge as a subject of serious scrutiny. But concerns won’t belong exclusively to theologically suspicious Baptists: a newly revealed episode from the candidate’s time as a lay leader in the LDS church could raise eyebrows among women’s advocates.
While serving as bishop of a Mormon congregation near Boston in the early 80’s, Romney once threatened to excommunicate a young single mother if she did not give her soon-to-be-born son up for adoption, according to a passage from a forthcoming book, “The Real Romney.” excerpted this week in Vanity Fair.
The anecdote, which Romney has disputed, sheds new light on a compelling part of the candidate’s religious life—one that serves, politically, as a double-edged sword. On one hand Romney’s time spent as a minister of his faith gave him the unique opportunity of serving low-income Boston neighborhoods, undercutting the narrative that he’s an out-of-touch millionaire. On the other, his role as a representative of the church sometimes put him in a position of standing up for politically unsavory teachings.
Peggie Hayes had converted to Mormonism as a teenage along with her family, and told the book’s authors, Boston Globe reporters Michael Kranish and Scott Helman, that for a long time she found comfort in the faith’s teachings. After returning to the congregation as a 23-year-old divorced single mother, she soon got pregnant with a second child. Knowing she was in need of financial assistance, the Romneys arranged for her to do odd jobs for members of the congregation.
“Mitt was really good to us,” Hayes told the authors. “He did a lot for us.”
But while Hayes considered Romney a friend, he was also her bishop—which meant it was his job to pass along sometimes-harsh church counsel. The tension between the two relationships came to the forefront one day when he came over to her apartment, and encouraged her to turn her son over to the church’s adoption agency when he was born. (The church’s position is that if a happy marriage between parents of a newborn seems unlikely, adoption is preferable to single parenting.)
Hayes was offended by the suggestion, and told Romney she would never give up her son. But, according to Hayes, Romney told her, “Well, this is what the church wants you to do, and if you don’t, then you could be excommunicated for failing to follow the leadership of the church.”
Though she was defiant, the authors write, “In that moment, she also felt intimidated. Here was Romney, who held great power as her church leader and was the head of a wealthy, prominent Belmont family, sitting in her gritty apartment making grave demands.”
So, here we are in a thread discussion adoption, and you somehow parse that into mormons not supporting life? Wow.
I see some of that in this story and the comments following. The hatred of Romney and his mormonism is so strong that this story is presented as a major negative. The headline suggests something much worse than the actual fact. With so many claiming that Romney is an anti-life baby killer, this article seems to suggest that really isn't the case (at least at the time of this story).
I would appear to me that this is one point on the anti-abortion side for Romney. Alas, there are a lot of points on the other side for him, too. But only the folks looking for something to hate see this story as a bad thing.
1) She returns to the congregation as a single mom.
2) Not making it financially as a single mom, she depends on the church to help her make ends meet.
3) She gets pregnant out of wedlock, which means her financial dependency would increase, as she would be even less able to work while caring for a baby.
4) Mitt tells her that she cannot expect the church to subsidize her bad choices any further. She cannot support a new baby. She should give it up for adoption.
If I was in Mitt's position, I would have done the same. Failure to enforce expecting responsibility will doom any group.
He wasn't forcing her to give up the baby. He was just telling her that the church membership had been helping support her, she betrayed that support by getting pregnant out of wedlock. If she want's to keep the baby, don't expect any more support from the church.
In other words, you can have as many babies as you want, but should not expect others to pay for your choices.
There are two things the law should for the child of a single mother — to get married, or to have the child adopted.
Single motherhood is a criminal activity. As most crimes left unchecked do, social tolerance for single motherhood bears serious and continuing harm for a society. It is an incredibly corrosive thing.
Historically, single motherhood has been a crime under common and statute law. There is good reason why it is a crime.
It is NOT a good thing in our times that single motherhood is tolerated, supported, even celebrated.
Look at how this very article raises up the cult of the victim, victimology, of single motherhood. Good and historically-knowledgeable men and women who cross this cult are branded as heretics who must be driven out of the society. That is like banning fire alarms and fire departments because the alarms and sirens are just so bothersome and irritating.
If Obama pushing this angle and attaches it to Romney, HE IS DONE. Good grief, what next, an only 1 child policy like China?
You do know that historically single motherhood has been a crime, right? Do you know what that crime is called, and WHY it was a crime? If you do not know these things it would be wise for you to go and learn them.
Do YOU want children to be poor, sick, deprived of proper nurture? What other foolish hysterical reactions do you have to the basic social history of mankind?
You cannot legislate morality.
Nothing you wrote will be a winnable argument with the general election voters.
(1) Do you know that single motherhood has been a crime for hundreds of years and more, back to English Common Law, and in our own common law and statute law until only very recently, right? Do you know what that crime is called, and WHY it was a crime?
(2) Why let Obama determine HOW and WHAT our campaign messages are? Is Obama our King?
(3) Please know that the phrase “You cannot legislate morality” is (a) false, (b) a strawman for avoiding needed discussions of morality, and (c) a propaganda motto of those forces who would destroy our society in order to raise up some imagined secular utopia. It is a motto of the pro-abortion movement, of the Marxists, the social deconstructionists, the anarcho-liberatians, the sexual libertines. It is utterly false.
ALL legislation and law is based in morality. All law is a form of moral code. A moral society is a law-abiding society, and an immoral society devolves into chaos and tyranny, into both lawlessness and tyranny at the same time.
Without a respect for, an appreciation and understanding of morals and how good laws are moral laws, how some parts morality must become parts of law in any viable culture, a society that is tolerates immorality and mocks morality always evolves a huge burden of inscrutable and invasive laws that dictate EVERY aspect of life, and in ever contradictory ways. Everything, every action, becomes illegal if the law were to be completely enforced. The laws then come to be enforced by whim of the enforcer, and are applied harshly. A multitude of petty tyrants arise. No one is safe, no one is free.
Only morality and a regard for that morality both in the written law and in the social custom keep a society free, and the people within that society safe.
No. Whats wrong with being ex-communicated? She can go find anoither church willing to subsidize her.
Utterly false. Morality is legislated every day. What IS the law but enforced morality? What are the laws about theft and robbery, but a codification of "Thou shall not steal"? What about legislation about "hate crimes", discouraging smoking in public, etc, etc?
The proper venue for legislation is to discourage actions which would tend to be harmful to society. Single motherhood is one of THE MOST DESTRUCTIVE activities to a modern society.
And do we know the story is even true? If so, did he go to her home alone? If so, that is strictly against church policy. If it’s true and he did go alone - why?
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IIRC that church policy doesn’t extend to Bishops. I know I had more than one Bishop show up to the house alone. HT’s, VTs and such are always in pairs, but I don’t think most Bishops follow that.
If this is true, who knows. I can see it happening though.
Are they just outright lying, or decieved at lower levels?
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A little bit of both. They are told that they are Christians (the only true Christians) and that their Jesus is the Biblical one. What they don’t say is that they don’t believe anyone outside of the Mormon church is Christian - only them.
Most LDS just repeat what they are told and don’t think for themselves a quote from one of their manuals states “when the prophet speaks, the thinking has been done”.
There is also a pattern of lying to make the LDS church look good. This shows up when you ask point blank questions that may be embarrassing. Part of the justification for this lying is the ‘milk before meat’ doctrine, that you need to learn and understand certain things and then are told the ‘meat’ doctrines only after you are LDS. This extends to giving ‘gentiles’ (all non Mormons even Jews) the barest of milk.
Elsie has a video that is well worth watching of one of their leaders explaining how they shouldn’t answer.
Here is something I have posted before about just how the LDS lie to people to make them sound like just another Christian denomination.
Every member is expected to find ‘investigators’ (people who would be interested in converting who take the missionary discussions - similar to RCIA). There is also a lot of people who hear things about beliefs but don’t know enough to know what the LDS are saying, that they use different meanings for terms, even though the LDS usually know that Christians mean different things. A typical exchange could go like this...
non - LDS - “I have a lot of Mormon friends, and they are nice people, but don’t Mormons believe Jesus and Satan are brothers?”
LDS - No! We don’t believe that at all! Jesus is the only begotten Son of God! Joseph Smith saw Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and they said that all other churches had some problems and Joseph needed to start a Church that was the same as the one when Jesus Christ was on the Earth. Why don’t you come over for dinner and we will have the missionaries talk to you? There is a set of 6 discussions that they give that shows what we believe.
non-LDS - “Well, ok, but I read somewhere that Mormons believe they will become Gods”
LDS - “That was probably written by someone who has a grudge against the Church. They probably are one of the ones who gets paid to badmouth the Church or someone who couldn’t live by the principles of the Church so they left or they were offended by someone in their ward.
Ok, lets parse this. Notice how many times “the Church” is used. For the LDS it is all about “the Church”. LDS ‘testimonies’ often start out with “I know the Church is true”.
Then there is the automatic denial that Jesus and Satan are brothers. We saw it on this a thread the other day even. Now, all LDS know that their church teaches Jesus and Satan are spirit brothers. So why would you get a resounding “NO”? Because it makes their theology look silly. By stating “No” the LDS are lying to you, but they are thinking “Well they aren’t flesh brothers, just spirit brothers like we all are, Jesus is our Elder brother”.
The other day an LDS came on one of these threads and stated “Jesus and Lucifer aren’t brothers, as if by Mary!”. Notice the subtlety of it. “As if by Mary” implying they aren’t physical brothers (which no one claimed). But they left out That Lucifer was the second born and Jesus was the firstborn of the spirit children.
Next we come to what would appear to be a rebuttal to the claim Jesus and Satan are brothers. “Jesus is the only begotten Son of God!” what they are not telling you is that they mean it in a literal sense. Jesus and Satan are SPIRIT brothers (like all of us) but Jesus is God’s physical son, God came down, had sex with Mary and conceived Jesus. So it isn’t a rebuttal at all and the LDS know that. They are intentionally twisting words to make you think they don’t believe Jesus and Satan are Spirit brothers.
Next Phrase - “Joseph Smith saw Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and they said that all other churches had some problems and Joseph needed to start a Church that was the same as the one when Jesus Christ was on the Earth.” This is referring to the “First Vision” (of which there are several contradictory accounts) and the Great Apostasy. The LDS will tone down things said about other Christians. In the first vision account, Smith isn’t told that other churches ‘had problems’ he was told “I was answered that I must join none of them, for they were all wrong; and the Personage who addressed me said that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight; that those professors were all corrupt http://lds.org/library/display/0,4945,104-1-3-4,00.html
“All wrong”, “Corrupt” and Creeds an abomination are not the same as “some problems” and the LDS know that. But they will soften it in order to not scare people off or to put the LDS church in a ‘better light’.
Next - about becoming Gods. Notice the LDS response is to go down a rabbit hole, rather than addressing the comment. Instead they lead the person to believe that the source was unreliable, or written by someone who had something to gain (money) or a former Mormon with a grudge. The question itself isn’t even addressed (lying by omission). It also causes the person to think that they might be wrong and that the LDS don’t believe that, even though the LDS person knows they do.
Finally, the invitation to meet with the missionaries. There is an assumption by many that these are people who know more about Mormonism than the average member and that isn’t true either. Most men and quite a few women serve LDS missions (I nearly did). They don’t have special knowledge. They also don’t tell you is the goal of those 6 discussions is to get you baptized Mormon and there is pressure put on you to read the Book of Mormon, pray about it, make commitments and convert. Those 6 discussions aren’t just a summary of LDS beliefs, they are the requirements for conversion and that is their goal. But they don’t tell you that, they make it sound like this is just a friendly way of talking to knowledgeable people about what the LDS believe.
Also, there is the doctrine of ‘line upon line, precept upon precept’ or “milk before meat”, that coverts are only told doctrines when they are spiritually ready to hear them. The missionary discussions are the barest of milk. You learn one set of things in them, and then after you convert you start to learn the rest of LDS theology. Then after a year of faithful membership (sometimes more) you get to go to the LDS temple and learn the ‘meat’ doctrines and are sworn to secrecy (used to have to swear blood oaths).
Hope this helps.
Everything about Romney just oozes out that he is a complete egomaniac, arrogant-to-the-max, control freak who is convinced he is an up and coming G-d. It probably gave him a tingle to scare the “little woman” to death. You can't believe in an omnipotent universal creator master G-d if you think you are a G-d..and you can't serve two masters.
Romney does not act anything like the Mormons I know. This man oozes a level of dark arrogance that is through the roof. It's disgusting And I hate to say it but every time I see his wife and sons they look just like an abused family would look if they had to put on a face for the camera.
The man is not just fake..underneath he is eerie. Others have said he seems deceptive..like a used car salesman..I'm thinking he is more of a dark shadows kind character..profoundly sinister.
I CAN NOT BELIEVE ANY PART OF MY PARTY IS CONSIDERING THIS SLEAZEBALL!
No one is forcing you to be a member of hte “cult.”
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Leaving Mormonsim isn’t that simple. For someone to leave, they risk their ‘salvation’, most, if not all, of their friends, sometimes their job and even their families.
Mormons are big on shunning.
Romney does not act anything like the Mormons I know. This man oozes a level of dark arrogance that is through the roof.
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Unfortunately he acts like a lot of Mormons I know. The arrogance is part of Mormonism.
Well..the ones I know are from the Midwest and they are converts from the Methodist church..so that may explain a lot.
But I can't believe they all act just like Romney. It seems to me they would have had their butts kicked years ago for acting like all around filthy jerks. At least that's what has usually happened to self proclaimed G-ds throughout history.
I don't see Romney helping the image of Mormons in any way.
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