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.
re: 400
Gorcha.
It will be interesting to see if it works
It will work or the poster will be banned, I assure you. And if it comes down to it, I will speak of the following you to a second thread to post to you personally because I read it when I was doing a search on your screen name at our first encounter when I was trying to discover if you were yet another Mormonism/Romney Apologist new at FR. I must say, the stalking notion does seem in paly here and the posts are clearly trying to bait you into more reactions. we don’t need that stuff at FR. More later, FRiend. [BTW, thnak you for your service to this country.]
Thanks.
re: 402
“.... when I was trying to discover if you were yet another Mormonism/Romney Apologist new at FR.”
>>>> To save time, you should have asked me.<<<
“[BTW, thnak (sic) you for your service to this country”
>>> My pleasure.<<<
>> What you seem to be doing is striving after meat ....
>> .... Trying to understand the things of God without the
>> Holy Ghost to help discern truth can be dangerous.
OK ... you are using the “milk before meat” argument to try to get me to shut up about the endowment/sealing steps that are required for someone to get full exaltation according to LDS doctrine. Maybe this will sound condescending but it’ll make sense to anyone who is trying to seek the truth honestly.
The whole reason why the temple endowment is full of secrecy was because it was a preliminary step that Joseph Smith used on fellow Nauvoo followers to make sure they would keep their mouths shut about plural marriage. At the time that Joseph Smith introduced plural marriage it was ILLEGAL to practice bigamy or any other form of polygny in the state of Illinois. It was also against the church’s own Doctrine & Covenants. It wasn’t until 1852 that the church started to be honest (for a few decades) about their practice of plural marriage.
The temple endowment is heavily plagiarized from Masonic ceremonies that Joseph Smith went through himself just 6 weeks before he introduced the Endowment. And you won’t find a reputable scholar on this subject who thinks that the Masonic ceremonies originated before the medieval era. Ever heard of the handgrip of the Entered Apprentice? Ever heard of the handgrip of the Fellow Craft? Ever heard of the handgrip of the Master Mason? These handgrips have been plagiarized.
Some may call it sacred plagiarism to coverup the secret violations of Constitutionally sound laws in favor of God’s laws, but nevertheless its undeniably plagiarism and it was used to conspire in breaking the law. I’m sure most of the freepers here can understand these simple facts.
(1) In 1833, Illinois passes a law making it a crime to practice bigamy/polygamy.
(2) In 1835, the Mormon church puts Section 101 in their Doctrine & Covenants forbidding polygamy.
(3) In March 1843, Joseph Smith participates in Masonic rites and becomes a Master Mason.
(4) In May 1843, Joseph Smith introduces the Endowment, which contains word for word and symbolically so much of the key handgrips of the Masonic ceremonies.
(5) Those receiving their Endowments are put under covenant to keep this and the plural marriage sealings all secret from everyone; including the law enforcement officials of Illinois.
(6) Before someone can receive their marriage sealing they must first receive their Endowment and make the covenants of secrecy.
One more thing to add: according to the journals of my ancestors and other Mormon pioneers - they were taught that the Celestial Kingdom has 3 levels - the lowest level for those who choose to never marry; the middle level for the monogamists; and the highest level for those who enter into plural marriage. And its only because of this requirement for reaching the highest level that my great-great-great grandmothers ever agreed to let their husbands take plural wives.
A personal note to add: I made a promise to God that I would not plagiarize/cheat before I ever made any promises in the temple. And that’s why I feel totally free to talk about any ceremony that involves Masonic plagiarisms. I learned AFTER I got the Endowment about the plagiarisms; when frankly I should’ve learned about them beforehand.
The temple endowment is heavily plagiarized from Masonic ceremonies that Joseph Smith went through himself just 6 weeks before he introduced the Endowment. And you won’t find a reputable scholar on this subject who thinks that the Masonic ceremonies originated before the medieval era. Ever heard of the handgrip of the Entered Apprentice? Ever heard of the handgrip of the Fellow Craft? Ever heard of the handgrip of the Master Mason? These handgrips have been plagiarized.Um, yeah, but have you ever heard of the Hermetic Tradition? You know, the Order of the Golden Dawn, The Corpus Hermeticum, G. Bruno, C. Agrippa? Also: The Masons. This is where I took the moniker Asclepius, by the way: from the Corpus Hermeticum. Hermeticism is Westernized Kabballah (Jewish mysticism) after the Sephardic tradition mingled with neo-Platonism, grrr-nostic, and esoteric Christian influences. (Did you ever wonder about the hexagrams [Star of David] on Masonic temples?) My point: Joseph Smith did not have to plagiarize anyone if it is the case that his rites and rituals resemble Masonic practice, because the Masonic order itself is but a branch that grows from the same ancient tree. And a fallen branch at that. Have you ever seen those elderly masons zipping around in tiny cars at civic parades etc.? They used to be an initiatic order; now they are yet another civic association that raises funds to buy fire engines or MRI machines etc.
It will work or the poster will be banned, I assure you.Of the 2 of us, TG and I, I'm the only one posting on-topic and you want to ban me?--I have posted no insults, no obscenities, no provocations. Of the 2 of us, I'm the only one who has not had a post to this forum already deleted by an administrator (#351, which I did not report, BTW), and you want to ban me? This is interesting. I wonder how it will play out.
Yet we actually have Apologists on this forum trying to persuade that Smith did not commit adultery with the married women Smith ‘took in marriage’ while they were still married to another husband. The astonishing truths about the adulterous fraud who founded Mormonism make it almost unbelievable that so many intelligent, God-fearing, serious about a relationship with God fellow human beings are taken in by this cult! But then, we see it with Islam also, so I guess I shouldn’t be so astonished; Satan relies on human pride and our built-in desire for God’s love to lead us astray. At least Islam doesn’t claim to be THE restored Christianity ...
Nice try, but I certainly didn’t write that I want to get you banned. And you are trying to bait the poster.
I think the same level of scrutiny that’s being applied towards the Book of Mormon should be applied towards the Bible, Koran or any other religious holy book.No book has been more scrutinized than the Bible. This is empirical fact. In fact, there is a whole discipline that calls itself "non-biblical textual criticism" because textual criticism of any kind--whether so-called higher criticism, or JEPD theory etc.--is almost always biblical criticism unless otherwise specified. With the Koran and the Book of Mormon, however, the respective provenances of the documents are known: these are not redactions or recensions (to use the language of textual criticism), these are instead continuous documents that appear in historical time at a certain known point. Hence: With the Koran and the Book of Mormon other problems obtain: the problems are not so much textual as intertextual, e.g. what were the literary and other influences that informed the production of these documents, for what purpose, and to what degree. In other words, the labour becomes less analytical and more historical.
Nice try, but I certainly didn’t write that I want to get you banned. And you are trying to bait the poster.Yes, you did, and in a public forum, and you suggested a plan for how to do so to TG, and it involved harassing the moderators with lots of complaints etc. I have no problem with this, by the way. I was just commenting on your odd sense of proportion.
At least Islam doesn’t claim to be THE restored Christianity ...Well, yes, it sort of does. Mohammad is the "Seal of the Prophets," which as the ummma (community of scholars) understands it--if I understand the umma correctly--means that Mohammad both completes and corrects the Abrahamic tradition, of which Jesus (recognized as a prophet) and the Apostles are members in good standing.
Take it any way you choose, professor.
... one must simply follow the commands of Christ ...Fascinating. Because someone handed me a gospel tract today that said that all I needed was faith. Not that I'm against commands, mind you. I'm a Jew; we're all about commands, lots and lots of commands in the form of precise specifications--i.e. mitzvot, of which, according to tradition, we have 613, only the sages disagree on what they are and exactly how they are numbered. And some of them don't apply anymore, e.g. the ones where we are commanded to kill people that no longer exist, or not to eat foods that we can no longer identify. I digress.
Take it any way you choose, professor.I choose to ignore it and continue to march. Please: report me.
I have no need or reason to ‘report you’. Have you had this persecution complex for very long? Bwahahaha ... see, this is why I earlier stated some of your posts are amusing and I wouldn’t want to see you banned. Besides, eventually we will exchange Hebrew phrases from perhaps Genesis and your being an observant Jew will lend credulity to my poor Hebrew scholarship.
All of which raises the question: Are we religious bigots if we refuse to vote for a believing Mormon?For me this is the only relevant question, but the question needs to be corrected, because whether someone is a bigot or not really doesn't interest me. The question should read something like, all other things being equal, should we--conservatives--vote against the Mormon candidate solely on the grounds that he or she is a Mormon. To this question I am forced to answer: absolutely not. There are lots of Mormons in civic and public life; they conduct themselves civilly, they behave themselves responsibly, and they tend to pursue policies with which I tend to agree.
I have no need or reason to ‘report you’. Have you had this persecution complex for very long? Bwahahaha ... see, this is why I earlier stated some of your posts are amusing and I wouldn’t want to see you banned. Besides, eventually we will exchange Hebrew phrases from perhaps Genesis and your being an observant Jew will lend credulity to my poor Hebrew scholarship.Here is what you wrote.
It will work or the poster will be banned, I assure you.And again:
So now I’m going to ask you to —for the good of the forum which is sullied by these interactions between adversarial posters— please push the abuse button (the link at the start of the thread where ‘report abuse’ is cited) and request from the administrative moderator that post “A” be put on notice to stop posting to you or mentioning you or your posts. I’ve had a whining Mormonism Apologist do that with me, so this isn’t a slam on you, just a suggestion of how to stop this baiting “A” keeps offering ... even I have noted he followed you from at least one other thread, to make personal comments to/about you, so you have every right to report that which is clearly upsetting. FreeRepublic doesn’t need these ‘xchanges’ generated from such behaviors.So perhaps I misunderstood you. Please explain to me precisely what you meant.
I’m sorry, was I in error to assume you would have the good form to avoid being banned?
I’m sorry, was I in error to assume you would have the good form to avoid being banned?Of the 2 of us, TG and I, I am the only one of us posting on-topic, the only one of us who has anything intelligent to contribute to this thread. Nor do I insult others; nor do I spew obscenities; nor do I rant, flame, or troll. Nor like you, do I rebuke others for no reason at all. Why would I get banned for behavior that is consonant with the goals, norms, and values of this community?
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