LDS affirms neutrality on Romney and others

While Evangelicals' moral views on issues like abortion and same-sex marriage line up with Romney, their collective suspicion of the LDS Church itself as "non-Christian" poses a formidable challenge he'll have to get beyond to secure the Republican nomination.

Another political scientist, Kelly Patterson at BYU, said people who've never paid attention to the LDS Church and its relationship to politics will find the statement helpful "because it explains what it considers to be the boundaries for its relationship with politicians," he said.

While opponents may dismiss it, supporters "will find the statement reassuring" in resolving doubts that fence-sitters may have. Most importantly, Patterson said, the statement will likely "help people nationally understand what is locally understood" about the church's way of dealing with political issues.

Noting that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is not only LDS but a Democrat, he said there's no evidence the church has sought to dictate to him in any way, though he went against the church's public position in opposing a proposed constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

"National observers often confuse (LDS voters') ideological homogeneity with direction from the LDS leadership. ... Because LDS voters tend to be conservative, there is the appearance of unanimity," Patterson said.

Reporters who have covered the Evangelical Christian view of religion and politics "apply that wholesale to the LDS experience, and it's not comparable," he said. "It's very different. You see instances of Christian Evangelicals taking positions in politics and being engaged in ways the LDS Church has not."

Russell Arben Fox, assistant professor of political science at Friends University in Wichita, Kan., said he sees the church's statement as an attempt to do two things: first, to respond to continued questions about Romney's faith "without seeming especially reactive or defensive" while communicating that "Mormons are not weird."

That's been one of President Gordon B. Hinckley's primary goals in media interviews, Fox said.

One recent online article compared Latter-day Saints to Scientologists, allowing that "Mormons are more respected because they've been around longer," he said.

The church has "a real desire to make it seem as though Latter-day Saints are an ordinary, decidedly non-weird and non-insular group of people who are putting forward a straightforward Christian message and are not playing with the minds of members or inculcating into them strange beliefs."

Secondly, he believes the statement is responding to allegations that church members follow their prophet on all matters, both spiritual and political, because the church is an authoritarian institution. "That's a more interesting problem" because "there are some ways in which the church is that."

He believes the statement also "is (putting forward) some part of a larger revolution in the way the church understands itself operating in the world" of politics. LDS leaders have "piggybacked on the Christian Right movement in some ways with some issues," he said. If the church wants to continue doing so, "they have to figure out how they fit. One way is to clear up any misunderstandings about how people within the church — who want to reach out to that segment — operate.

"In that way some of the suspicions may disappear and it may be easier for the next Mormon guy trying to appeal to the Christian Right."

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