The Mormon Factor

Upon watching the film September Dawn I have come to the realization that arguments against opposition to Mitt Romney because of his Mormon faith is false. Their violent founding history has not deterred my consideration of Romney, but it has spurred my thoughts about judging a presidential candidate based upon their faith. Of course, Mormonism has had a turbulent foundation and their teachings are blatantly false. According the orthodox Christian beliefs, I must say that it is heresy.

With that theological background, Mormons have similar moral values. They are close to the Judeo-Christian value system, and their moral strengths are evident in everyday encounters with families. They truly live out their faith to the fullest, and their love and kindness is beyond a lot of orthodox Christian’s. Take away religious beliefs, and then you will be able to see that Mormons and Evangelicals are nearly identical.

The constitution gives the command that there should be no such religious litmus tests on those who seek office. This was given within the context of Protestants, Catholics and the occasional Jew. They were all under the same traditional guise of faith; although each faction would purport that the others were false. Although they shared general morality, they viewed each other with suspicion and would label them as people who lived contrary to true revelation. Fast forward to today. Christian leaders who hold an evangelical point of view would label Mormonism as false. The faith simply is not the true account of the Christian story. The LDS believe in many gods and do not agree with the Nicean Creed.

After thinking about the litmus test question, I could not help but ponder about the implications of that. The people who call anti-Romneyites bigots would probably hold a religious litmus test towards a couple of other groups. Many Muslims hold similar moral views as Christians. What if there was a Muslim who believed in small government and family values? The only catch would be the fact that he advocated for the subservience of women in the public realm and the suppression on others in Sharia law. What if there was an avowed atheist who ran for office? Would people turn away from him/her since they have not foundation to believe that all people are created equal (since pure Darwinian logic is not compatible with that Deist view)?

Morality is an important component of people’s views on political candidates. It is one component of the larger scheme of political decision making. I have said it before, that people have a right to deny votes to any candidate, based upon any means. I purposefully wrote votes to denote that people cannot be denied entry into the political process. Any person has the ability to run for office, yet they can be denied votes based upon a variety of issues.