Article VI Blog

Ken Woodward Strikes Again

I discovered this morning's big Romney-religion item late last night, just as I was about to put this post to bed. Ken Woodward, writing in the New York Times, thinks Romney should use his May commencement speech at Regent University (Pat Robertson's school) to give a Kennedy-type speech. Woodward's most intriguing argument is that Romney needs to teach voters about his faith:

It isn’t just evangelical Christians in the Republican base who find Mr. Romney’s religion a stumbling block. Among those who identify themselves as liberal, almost half say they would not support a Mormon for president. Although with 5.6 million adherents Mormonism is the nation’s fourth-largest denomination, 57 percent of respondents to a recent CBS poll said they know little or nothing about Mormon beliefs and practices. Mr. Romney needs to be their teacher, whether he likes that role or not.

John and I have always disagreed with this view. It's not a candidate's job to explain the religious doctrines of his or her church.

Besides, is there any doubt what the Woodwards of the world would do to Romney if he took this advice? Woodward, Newsweek's retired former religion editor, is unfriendly to religion generally and has historically been pretty hard on the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. (I also recall that he was an equal-opportunity offender; I'm not sure Woodward ever met a church he liked.) Typically, in this piece he either gets several points of LDS doctrine and practice wrong, or simply distorts them. I won't try to refute all that; it has become really tiresome, and not what we generally do on this blog anyway.

Significantly, Woodward asks much more of Romney than to emulate Kennedy. All Kennedy had to do was make it clear he would not take orders from Rome. Romney has already said, categorically, that he won't be controlled by Salt Lake City. So what's left?

What Woodward wants Romney to do is become kind of a candidate/Sunday school teacher. Can you imagine the stories that would result as reporters and others dug into whether Romney was really describing Mormon doctrine correctly? The inevitable quotes and sound bites from critics of Mormonism, and the confusing "point-counterpoint" that would result? It would not be pretty. But that's probably what Woodward and his ilk are hoping for.

John adds: I am beginning to wonder if all these calls for Romney to explain Mormonism are from people too lazy to figure out Mormons for themselves. PICK UP A BOOK, PEOPLE! Better, go ask a Mormon; they are not all missionaries, they will not all immediately attempt to convert you, besides, you can always say "no" if they do.

Captain Ed has a very interesting response worthy of extensive quotation:

All of this drivel serves only to perpetuate Mormon bigotry. I could care less what Romney's conception of God is, as long as it doesn't involve strapping on suicide vests or inducing hundreds of people to drink poisoned Kool-Aid. Mormons have lived and thrived in this nation for over a century, and except for a few lunatics who no longer belong to the main Mormon church and insist on polygamy and child marriage, cause no more problems than anyone else. We're not electing an American Pope, we're electing a President, and Romney's choice of religion is neither debilitating nor exotic.

Woodward couches this wretched laundry list of Mormophobia as advice to Romney on how he can assuage the fears of bigots. My advice to Romney is to ignore it altogether and refrain from enabling that kind of debate. He won't convince the bigots anyway, and the rest of us are astute enough to understand that his religion presents no more bar to meeting Presidential responsibilities than did the Deism of our founders, or the Catholicism of John F Kennedy. Maybe if he shows that the people obsessed with his faith mostly consist of journalists looking for a cheap shot at him, the Times and other publications will stop offering their inane "advice".

As to Morrisey's comments about Pat Robertson, he is both right and wrong. There is a bit of the crazy uncle in Robertson, but he is a crazy uncle a lot of people still listen to; politics is the art of reaching people where they are and bringing them to you. Has to be done.

Lowell updates: Hugh Hewitt also weighs in, noting that in addition to stating that "to many Americans, Mormonism is a church with the soul of a corporation," Woodward makes "a few other memorable assertions:"

"Among the reasons Americans distrust the Mormon church is Mormon clannishness"; "A good Mormon is a busy Mormon"; ."Mormons like to hire other Mormons"; "Mormons are perceived to be unusually secretive…This attitude has fed anti-Mormon charges of secret and unholy rites"; and "Any journalist who has covered the church knows that Mormons speak one way among themselves, another among outsiders."

Substitute "Jew" for "Mormon." Ask yourself if the Times would have published such a piece even if it ended with a ringing declaration against the idea of refusing to vote for a Jew for president. I am amazed the editors missed the obvious title for the piece "Protocols of the Elders of New Zion."

I must admit, I have become hardened to this sort of thing, and initially dismissed Woodward's bigoted statements as typical of the claptrap he has produced about Mormonism over the years. As Jan Shipps, the foremost non-Mormon scholar of Mormonism, noted during the 2002 Olympics, Woodward couldn't get even one LDS General Authority to speak to him about a Newsweek article he was writing on the Church and the Games; the LDS leaders were presumably gun-shy because of Woodward's poor history of writing about Mormons. (It seems to me that during his time as Newsweek's religion editor, Woodward burned most of the religions he wrote about; it always amazed me that a journalist in such a position was deeply cynical about religion in general.)

I focused above on Woodward's advice that Romney try to explain his religious beliefs, but I also think the collective outrage from Hugh, Ed, Dean Barnett, and others over the bigotry in Woodward's op-ed is well-placed.

MSM Obsession with Romney's Religion (Or Is It Just Obtuseness?)

News items over the weekend are pretty thin, but if last week's stories are any indication, an interesting but unsurprising phenomenon is emerging as a clear pattern: The majority of major MSM stories about Romney mention his religion.

Latest example: In the wake of Romney's fund-raising success last week, Scott Simon of NPR's Weekend Edition did a 5-minute interview on Saturday with David Campbell, a Mormon political science professor at Notre Dame (of all places!). There's very little new here, but in Simon's view, the first quarter financial results "called attention to Romney's faith."

They did? Seems to me the news media called attention to the Mormon angle, thanks to the New York Times report that 15% of the funds donated came from the State of Utah. (Simon simply called it "a significant amount." So much for precision.) Is that really the proper centerpiece to the fund-raising story?

Simon also duly noted that "several recent polls" showed that 1/3 of Americans are "less likely to vote for a Mormon" for president. We're going to be hearing uncritical repetition of that one for months, I'm afraid.

Looks like New Hampshire GOP voters don't line up with those "recent polls" to which Simon lazily refers.

In Other News . . .

An altercation outside the LDS Temple in Mesa. This one's for John.

John comments: I am embarrassed to be a creedal Christian with stories like this. Thank goodness for this very key graph:

It has gotten so bad that a more moderate group of Phoenix evangelicals has vowed to skip their annual trip to preach outside the pageant until Pursifull and his crew tone it down.

Although may I say, I think preaching outside a Mormon Easter pageant is distasteful to me, even if moderately done. I am sorely tempted to make a long theological argument for how Christ exampled evangelism, but that is outside the scope of this blog. This event puts me in mind of the Florida confrontation with Romney a while back. Events like this are just rude to say the least, but that is not a crime. I'm not sure rudeness will win many converts. I'll leave it to Lowell to comment on the reciprocal LDS behavior in the incident, save to note that it was reciprocal.

But more, this is un-American. Our constitution enables people to practice their faith in peace. Religious competition notwithstanding, there are appropriate and inappropriate ways to do this sort of thing and be within the bounds of American civil society. When we behave this way we give fuel to the fire of those that think us small minded and bigoted. I am beginning to think this election represents the "acid test" for the evangelical voice in politics. Either we uplift it and become avoice for good, or we succumb to the stereotypes that are routinely, and to date erroneously, assigned to us.

Back to Lowell: I don't think there is ever any organized LDS opposition to such preaching; we are generally counseled to ignore such folks. It does sound like in this case, an individual Mormon (a 64 year-old grandmother, no less!) got into an altercation with a protester.

Final item from John - Joe Carter takes on this past weekend's "Blog Against Theocracy." Typically, he does so very, very well. read it all, follow the links, consider carefully. Then ask yourself if these people can tell the difference between Evangelical and Mormons. Trust me, they can't, and if we insist on fighting amongst ourselves, we give them fuel.

Technorati Tags: Ken Woodward, Mormons, Mormonism, Romney, Scott Simon, Weekend Edition, David Campbell