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.
15 presidents of the United States of America:
George Washington (1732-1799) 1st.
initiated 11/4/1752 Fredericksburg Lodge No. 4, Virginia
James Monroe (1758-1831) 5th.
initiated 11/9/1775 Williamsburgh Lodge No. 6, Virginia
Andrew Jackson (1767-1845) 7th.
member Harmony Lodge No. 1; Grand Master 1822-24, Tennessee
James Knox Polk (1795-1849) 11th.
raised 9/4/1820 Columbia Lodge No. 31, Tennessee
member: Platte Lodge No. 56, Mo.
James Buchanan (1791-1868) 15th.
raised 1/24/1817 Lodge No. 43, Pennsylvania
Andrew Johnson (1808-1875) 17th.
initiated 1851, Greenville Lodge No. 119, Tennessee
James Abram Garfield , 20th.
raised 11/22/1864, Magnolia Lodge No. 20, Ohio
William McKinley (1843-1901) 25th.
raised 4/3/1865, Hiram Lodge No. 21, Virginia
Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) 26th.
raised 4/24/1901, Matinecock Lodge No. 806, Oyster Bay
William Howard Taft (1857-1930) 27th.
made a mason at sight 2/18/1909.
affiliated Kilwinning Lodge 356, Ohio
Warren Gamaliel Harding (1865-1923) 29th.
raised 8/13/1920, Marion Lodge No. 70, Ohio
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945) 32nd.
raised Nov. 28. 1911,
Harry S Truman (1884-1972) 33rd.
initiated 02/09/1909, Belton Lodge No. 450
raised 03/18/1909, Belton Lodge No. 450
Lyndon Baines Johnson (EA) (1908-1973) 36th.
initiated October 30, 1937
Gerald Ford
raised May 18, 1951, Columbia Lodge No.3
Grand Lodge of Washington, D.C. courtesy to Malta Lodge No 465 Grand Lodge Michigan, Grand Rapids
(b) Signators to the USA Declaration of Independence (1776):
8 freemasons out of 56 total.
Benjamin Franklin
Deputy Grand Master, Pennsylvania
John Hancock
St. Andrew’s Lodge, Boston
Joseph Hewes
visited Unanimity Lodge No. 7, Edenton, North Carolina: Dec. 27 1776
William Hooper
Hanover Lodge, Masonborough, North Carolina
Robert Treat Payne
attended Grand Lodge, Roxbury, Mass.: June 26, 1759
Richard Stockton
charter Master, St. John’s Lodge, Princeton, New Jersey: 1765
George Walton
Solomon’s Lodge No. 1, Savannah, Georgia
William Whipple
St. John’s Lodge, Portsmouth, New Hampshire
(c) Signators to the USA Constitution (1789):
Out of the 55 delegates, 9 signers were confirmed freemasons; 5 non-signing delegates were freemasons; 6 later became freemasons; 13 delegates have been claimed as freemasons on apparently insufficient evidence; 22 were known not to be freemasons.
9 freemasons out of 40 total.
George Washington
raised: Fredericksburg Lodge, Virginia: 1753
Benjamin Franklin
Lodge at Tun Tavern, Philadelphia: 1731
Rufus King
St John’s Lodge, Newburyport, Massachusetts
John Blair
First Grand Master, Virginia. Williamsburg Lodge No. 6
Gunning Bedford Jr.
First Grand Master, Delaware. Lodge 14, Christina Ferry, Delaware.
John Dickinson
Lodge No. 18, Dover, Delaware: 1780
Jacob Broom
Lodge No. 14, Christina Ferry, Delaware, 1780
David Brearley
First Grand Master, New Jersey: 1787. Military Lodge No. 19
Daniel Caroll
St. John’s Lodge No. 20, Maryland: 1781, Lodge No. 16, Baltimore
Later became freemasons:
Jonathan Dayton
Temple No. 1, Elizabeth Town, New Jersey
James McHenry
Spiritual Lodge No. 23, Baltimore, Maryland: 1806
William Patterson
Trinity Lodge No. 5, New Jersey: 1788. Berkshire Lodge No. 5, Stockbridge, Ma
Insufficient evidence:
Nicholas Gilman
“Either he or his father of the same name was initiated in St. John’s Lodge No. 1 at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, March 20, 1777.”*
Roger Sherman (1721-1793)
Signed “Declaration of Independence,” “Articles of Association.” “Articles of Confederation,” and Federal “Constitution.” Although a masonic apron ascribed to him is in the archive collection of Yale University, there is no record of his masonic association.
(d) Signators of the USA Articles of Confederation (1781):
10 freemasons out of (?) total.
Benedict Arnold
affiliated Hiram Lodge No. 1. New Haven, Connecticut: 1765/04/18 [AQC vol 80, pp. 120-2.]
(e) Generals in George Washington’s Continental Army:
31 freemasons out of 63 total.
Nicholas Herkimer (1715-1777), St. Patrick’s Lodge, Johnstown, New York
Morgan Lewis, Grand Master, New York
Jacob Morton, Grand Master, New York
Israel Putnam (1718-1790)
Rufus Putnam (1738-1824), Master, American Union Lodge
Baron von Steuben (1730-1794), Trinity Lodge No. 10, New York City
John Sullivan (1740-1796), Grand Master, New Hampshire
Joseph Warren (1741-1775), Massachusetts Provincial Grand Master
David Wooster (1710-177), Master, Hiram Lodge No. 1, Connecticut
(Note Gould’s History of Freemasonry mistakenly repeated C. W. Moore’s claim that all but Benedict Arnold were freemasons. vol. iv p 24 1885)
(f) Presidents of the Continental Congresses (1774-89):
4 freemasons out of (?) total.
Peyton Randolph of Virginia (1st)
John Hancock of Massachusetts (3rd )
Henry Laurens of South Carolina
Arthur St. Clair of Pennsylvania.
(g) Governors of the thirteen colonies during the Continental Congress:
10 freemasons out of 30 total.
(h) Chief Justices of the United States:
Oliver Ellsworth
John Marshall (also Grand Master of Virginia)
William Howard Taft
Frederick M. Vinson
Earl Warren (also Grand Master of California.)
SHHHH, good works are not a real Judeo-Christian value, and have no relevance to salvation, dontcha know.
When was Joseph Smith ever given a revelation that he should be justified in committing plagiarism?
As a High Priest, you should ask yourself when was Jesus ever justified in committing plagiarism? Did he not speak the same words as those old men in the OT. Oh wait, they were prophets. Does the Book of Mormon also commit plagiarism because if has prophesy, revelations and the very words of Christ as spoken in the old world? Is God a changeable God, or does he speak the same to all his children? Why would the temple ordinances and practices handed down through different dispensations have to be different? I would think that you would expect them to be the same given what you understand about dispensations and God's dealing with men on earth?
I guess he took this to mean himself!!
NIV Galatians 5:12
As for those agitators, I wish they would go the whole way and emasculate themselves!
I do???
Yes, you come across that way, did I misread your intent? If so, I apologize.
Don’t go by what you think I intend; but by what I post. ;^)
I usually try to be REALLY sarcastic so folks won’t have to wonder if I left off the /sarc tag ;^)
Sometimes I’m just to subtle for my own good, though.
I would say that God is the same. But in Mormonism it seems that God is always changing his mind on things. Just look at where Mormonism is now compared to 150 years ago. Adam is no longer God the Father. Blood atonement is out. Jackson County Missouri is no longer talked about as being the centerplace of Zion. Monogamy is no longer a great evil institution. The Book of Abraham is no longer considered by LDS scholars to be a translation of a record written upon papyrus by Abraham. The ancestors of the American Indians are no longer the descendants of Father Lehi who were kept hidden from the knowledge of all other nations. Immediate death is no longer the Lord's law for interracial marriage. Polygamy is no longer required for exaltation. The Law of Vengeance is gone. The penalties and five points of fellowship are gone.
>> Why would the temple ordinances and practices
>> handed down through different dispensations have
>> to be different? I would think that you would
>> expect them to be the same given what you
>> understand about dispensations and God's dealing
>> with men on earth?
The origination of the Masonic ceremonies was around the renaissance or late middle ages years amongst the construction workers. It was not handed down from ancient origins with the five points of fellowship, tokens with names, signs and penalties; and other wordings that are so consistent between the 1843 Masonic rites and the 1843 Endowment introduced by Joseph Smith. Interestingly, there is more in common between the 1843 Masonic rites and the 1843 LDS Endowment than there are between the 2007 LDS Endowment and the 1843 LDS Endowment. Claims that the Masonic ceremonies are of ancient origin is what's called "bearing false witness"; and I think many Freepers would know what the Bible says about bearing false witness.
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