Religion in the Presidential Campaign

Mitt Romney may have delivered a great speech yesterday, however I’m not alone in not having listened or watched it. Writes Jay at Stop the ACLU:

I didn’t listen to it, nor am I interested. Romney’s religion has never been an issue with me.

Don Surber sums up many concerns, with a blog post headlined, “It’s Not Your Religion, Mitt”:

It is the condescending manner in which you tried to out-liberal Ted Kennedy and now try to out-conservative Fred Thompson.

Analysis Ron Fourier lays out the issue quite plainly:

WASHINGTON – Mitt Romney‘s religion is only part of his problem. A bigger threat to his Republican presidential candidacy, advisers say, is a record of policy flip-flops and nagging doubts about his credibility.

And so Romney’s highly anticipated address Thursday was as much about his character as his Mormonism. He used an intensely personal issue — his religion — to address voters’ concerns about his authenticity and integrity, about the strength of his convictions.

No single speech is likely to fix such a big concern.

The concept that leads to a speech like this seems to be based on the condescending notion that one cannot oppose the irresistible charm of Mitt Romney unless one is some sort of anti-Mormon hater. Simply not true, and for folks like a me, an explanation that Mitt Romney isn’t a puppet of the Salt Lake City establishment hardly helps.

Meanwhile, Mike Huckabee is getting all sorts of religious questions as he goes. Some people think he’s in charge of deciding who goes to Heaven based on the question asked about Jews on the Don Imus show. Richard Cohen even absurdly got upset with Huckabee for his answer to the question of whether Mitt Romney is a Christian on This Week with George Stephanopoulos (Hat Tip: The Corner):

The reason I started with Stephanopoulos is that he provided the perfect opportunity for Huckabee to make some ringing statement in support of religious tolerance. He might have made some reference to the ugly anti-Catholic campaigns run against Al Smith (1928) and John F. Kennedy (1960) and how they had both been spearheaded by prominent members of the Protestant clergy, Methodist Bishop Adna Leonard in the former’s case, the renowned Norman Vincent Peale in the latter’s. (Peale later went on to receive a Presidential Medal of Freedom from Ronald Reagan.) In other words, Huckabee might have preached. Instead, he said Romney had to answer for himself the question of whether he’s a Christian.

So, Mike Huckabee could have stood up on This Week and given a speech painting his opponent as the victim of religious discrimination (and by the way not actually answering the question asked him.) I forget. When exactly did Huckabee join the Romney campaign?

Huckabee is also dodging questions about women in ministry:

Huckabee has given the same explanation every time he has declined to discuss his views on the creation of the earth. Pressed on why, as an active Baptist preacher, he wouldn’t detail the inner-workings of his faith for Christian voters, Huckabee said Baptists have so many different opinions about the details of Biblical doctrine.

“When you get down into the weeds of the doctrine, frankly, where two or more Baptists are gathered together, there are at least seven different opinions,” he said. “There’s no such thing as what I’d call an ‘absolute Baptist theology.’”

The ordained minister added that he’s happy to discuss his faith generally and the role it plays in his life.

“I think I’ve probably been asked far more questions about my faith than Mitt Romney’s been asked about his,” Huckabee said. “Maybe I ought to be doing the ‘God speech’ out there. I might even include an altar call and an offering with mine.”

Huckabee’s a tad annoyed about this and recently suggested Romney needs to be asked more about his faith:

Huckabee, an ordained Southern Baptist minister who has faced some pointed questions about his faith while on the campaign trail, says Governor Romney should not be exempt from such questioning. “If we’re going to ask me about my faith, let’s ask all the candidates about theirs,” he suggests. “Now as you noticed, I’m not hesitant or reluctant to talk about mine.”

As long as people don’t get too specific, anyway. But Huckabee does have a point. While Romney was never a professional minister, Mormonism doesn’t have a professional clergy the same way Protestants and Catholics do. Mitt was a missionary for 2 years in France and State Stake President of his church. Mike Huckabee was also president of the State Southern Baptist Convention. So, if Huckabee’s being asked these questions, Romney should be challenged as well.

“Governor, which afterlife do you think your opponents go to: the Celestial, Terrestial, or Telestial kingdoms?”

Governor Romney could then do as Huckabee did and demur on an issue that had nothing to do with being president. But, then at least the questions would be consistently asked, so that we would be wasting the time of both candidates and the American people in a fair and consistent manner.

Meanwhile, Fred Thompson has come out as a non-Churchgoer and that he attends church when he visits his mother in Tennessee. I can respect Thompson’s honesty about who he is and what he does and that he’s not pretending to be someone he’s not. Going to church doesn’t make you a good President. According to some pop theology, it doesn’t even have much to do with maintaining your relationship with Christ (a point I’d disagree with.)

Lincoln didn’t have a church, but the Presidency led him to seek God’s counsel quite a bit: “I have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere to go. My own wisdom, and that of all about me, seemed insufficient for the day.” You can only hope that if Thompson does get elected he’ll have that same wisdom.