I Believe…

Liam Hoare has a new post on Hackeryblog, wherein he asks several questions of Presidential candidate Mitt Romney, regarding his faith. Unfortunately, it’s obvious that Mr. Hoare knows little to nothing about the teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ and, instead of taking five minutes to do some research, has decided to learn about it from the new The Book of Mormon musical from the creators of South Park, presumably on the grounds that they portray everything else so accurately. ;-)

Anyway, the point is that I’d like to take a few minutes to answer his questions. Hopefully Mitt won’t mind. :-)

Hoare asks:

Do you believe that the current President of the LDS Church Thomas S. Monson speaks directly to God?

First of all, there’s no such thing as “the LDS Church.” Mitt Romney is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. If you’d like a shorter version of that name, “the Church of Jesus Christ” will do. If you’d like more information on this, please check out the Church’s media style guide.

That aside, it would be kind of difficult to anyone to be a Latter-day Saint without believing that, so I suspect that yes, Mitt Romney does sustain Thomas S. Monson as a prophet, seer, and revelator; and that as such, he believes that President Monson converses directly with God. However, it’s important to note that the only way Mr. Romney could possibly know this is if he, himself, is also a prophet. Ideally, everyone on Earth should be a prophet and converse directly with God (see Numbers 11:29, cf. vv.24-30).

Hoare then asks:

Do you believe that in 1978 God did change his mind about black people?

I severely doubt that Romney believes this, nor have I ever heard of anyone believing that. In order for this to be true, God would have had to have taken a position on black people, in the first place; and then that position would have to have been changed. The only position the Church has ever taken on black people is that they’re just like everyone else. As the Prophet Joseph Smith, Jr. stated:

[Negroes] came into the world slaves mentally and physically. Change their situation with the whites, and they would be like them. They have souls, and are subjects of salvation. Go into Cincinnati or any city, and find an educated [N]egro, who rides in his carriage, and you will see a man who has risen by the powers of his own mind to his exalted state of respectability. The slaves in Washington are more refined than many in high places, and the black boys will take the shine of many of those they brush and wait on. (Scriptural Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, 303).

(Note, of course, that in the 1840s, the word “Negroes” was completely politically correct.) ;-)

Now, admittedly, Brigham Young—who served as governor of the Utah territory in the 1850s—did allow slave owners to bring their slaves with them to the territory. However, this was a political expediency rather than Church policy. Of course, it is well established that Young was a racist, a definite product of his times. However, Church policy has never discriminated on the basis of skin color.

Continuing:

Do you believe that God lives on a planet called Kolob?

No, I don’t, and If Romney does, he’s never read the scriptures. Kolob isn’t even a planet; it’s a star. More importantly, though, the one time it’s mentioned in the Standard Works, it is in the context of being near God, not his residence.

…and that Jesus has his own planet as well?

I guess He might, but I’ve never heard anything that could even be remotely construed to mean this. I mean, it’s not illogical, but there’s not a shred of evidence for it.

Finally:

Do you believe that the Garden of Eden was in Jackson County, Missouri?

Most Latter-day Saints do, yes. We have no primary source for that belief, but various associates of Joseph Smith, Jr., stated that he taught this to be true. (See Ensign 34:1:54-55.)


So to finish up, Mr. Hoare, I hope I’ve been able to answer your questions, and hope even more so that I have not answered amiss of Mr. Romney’s beliefs. (We are, after all, different people, and thus we see things differently.) However, I would also like to point out one last thing: you state that:

Romney is wrong. The First Amendment is a two-way street: it grants individuals the freedom to practice their faith absent of central influence; but it clearly separates church from state in order to keep religion out of the public sphere. Kennedy acknowledged this in his address: “I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute, where no minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote [and] where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference”.

I believe you are taking Mr. Romney’s statements out of context. His argument is that “In recent years, the notion of the separation of church and state has been taken by some well beyond its original meaning,” and there’s really no denying that he’s right on that point. When the Founding Fathers stated that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” they were not stating that people should not be allowed to practice their respective religions in the public square; in fact, quite the opposite: there were to be no laws prohibiting them from doing so.

I think it’s very clear that the First Amendment is to assure the government allows people to be religious in the public square, but that it not restrict which religion they might follow (whether in public or in private). This law is also a foundational tenet of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints:

We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may. (Eleventh Article of Faith)

So, there you go. Hopefully I’ve answered not only the questions you asked, but also the one you didn’t enunciate: would a Romney Presidency constitute a veritable theocracy? The people of Massachusetts certainly didn’t seem to think so, and if he’s truly a Latter-day Saint, then neither does he.