Mormons and Idiosyncracy -- Sightings

Mitt Romney's candidacy for President -- now suspended -- brought considerable focus on his religious background. Mormonism, to say the least, is not well understood. It has a history that seems odd to many. That fact, led many, both on the left and the right to reject him out of hand. Now that Romney is out of the race, Martin Marty has taken a look at this issue -- the hate-speech against Mormongs (and Muslims as well). He suggests that every religion has its idiosyncracies, Mormonism included. There may be room to criticize, but hate-speech isn't appropriate. As usual, Marty's analysis is right on!

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Sightings 2/11/08


Mormons and Idiosyncracy
-- Martin E. Marty


Now that Governor Romney is off the campaign trail—we don't do any Sightings of candidates on the trail—we can, without commenting on him or the part his church and faith played in his demise, do a retrospective on the Mormon-hate that blighted air waves, the internet, and some printed quotations while he was spotlit. The locus classicus of the hate, one that has plenty of company, is the on-air MSNBC spewing by Lawrence O'Donnell, Jr., "pundit and actor," on the McLaughlin Group TV show. I quote: "Romney comes from a religion founded by a criminal who was anti-American, pro-slavery, and a rapist. And he comes from that lineage and says, 'I respect this religion fully.' . . . He's got to answer." The other religion that gets treated that way with impunity is Islam. O'Donnell was not treated with total impunity; he was knuckle-rapped with a feather-duster suspension. That could change by the time you read this, but for now the remark was not treated with the seriousness that an anti-black or anti-Semitic comment by the merest sportswriter would elicit.

One needs hold no brief for (or against) the Latter-day-Saints or the Muslims and their founders to find occasion to ask what went wrong, what goes wrong, when in a United States where so many good things are happening on the inter-religious, racial, ethnic, and gender front, this underground of "anti"s so frequently emerges. I've had numerous Latter-Day-Saint Ph.D. students, know some leaders, have spoken at some of their scholarly gatherings, have learned and taught much about their history, and can't find anyone who can find something that would rule out a Mormon as Mormon from being Chief Executive. (Curiously, the issue did not even come up, so far as I can remember, when Mitt Romney's father ran for President in a generation that putatively was more prejudiced than our enlightened generation is.)

Let the O'Donnells rant on as they present their bill of particulars: The Mormons have secrets. So do the Masons, who met lethal prejudice one hundred and fifty years ago, but get a free ride now along with your friendly neighborhood fraternities and sororities. Mormons are too clubby and do favors for each other. So are the Notre Dame (or any other strong college of your choice) grads. Or they are too successful. That's not a blight elsewhere in capitalist America. Finally: their founding story is really weird. Let's stop right there: I like to quote George Santayana, who wrote that "every living and healthy religion has a marked idiosyncrasy. Its power consists in its special and surprising message. . ." One notices: Every religion looks "idiosyncratic" and its stories are "surprising" to all others. We Christians and Jews are empowered, motivated, and—hey! I'm a Christian!—are "saved" by those stories and messages. We spend decades and energies helping fellow-citizens and ourselves live creatively with people who, again in Santayana's terms, propound "another world to live in."

Taking testimony about the evils of Mormonism by ex-Mormons is likely to be as objective as it is if it comes against Catholicism by ex-Catholics. Were it our calling, we could find profound fault with many policies and actions of some Latter-Day-Saints or members and leaders of other faiths. My own company, that of historians, is in the business of telling stories about others' stories. No one is to be uncritical, where there is often much to criticize. But criticism is one thing; hate-speech and untruths are another.


Martin E. Marty's biography, current projects, upcoming events, publications, and contact information can be found at www.illuminos.com.

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The February issue of the Martin Marty Center's Religion and Culture Web Forum presents an essay by M.Cooper Harriss of the University of Chicago, "The Preacher in the Text: Zora Neale Hurston and the Homiletics of Literature." Commentary from Kimberly Connor (University of San Francisco), Dolan Hubbard (Morgan State University), Carolyn Medine (University of Georgia), and Teresa Stricklen (Pittsburgh Theological Seminary) will be available on the forum's discussion board, where readers may also post responses.

Access this month's forum at:http://marty-center.uchicago.edu/webforum/index.shtml .

Access the discussion board at:https://cforum.uchicago.edu/viewforum.php?f=1

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Sightings comes from the Martin Marty Center at the University of Chicago Divinity School.

Comments

Hey Bob,

Point well taken. What business do we have using any kind of hate speech? So yes, away with that. I'd have no more trouble having a Mormon president than a president who claims any kind of faith. Who knows what's in politicians'minds anyway.

I will say that Mormon history has some peculiarities which mean it will always be in a class of its own when it comes to having to explain things that are hard to believe. (Well, Scientologist perhaps are in that class)

I am glad that there is an actual Bethlehem, Jerusalem, etc. Christian and Jewish scriptures arose naturally in the way that religions arise. Out of the crucible of myth and selection over time. The LDS church arose clearly in one man's mind. At least in that he sat down and wrote their Bible in one go. And that man was and is highly suspect.

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