The LDS Church issued the following statement concerning an invitation to Vice President Dick Cheney to speak at BYU:

An invitation by Brigham Young University to the vice president of the United States to be the commencement speaker next month has triggered discussion and some controversy over the issue of political neutrality.

Whatever the personal views of individual students or other members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the invitation is seen by the university�s board of trustees as one extended to someone holding the high office of vice president of the United States rather than to a partisan political figure.

The Salt Lake Tribune ran two articles in its edition this morning (29 March) related to the pending visit of the vice president.

One, a prominently displayed personal opinion piece by a political reporter, criticizes the Church, in intemperate and disrespectful language, for inviting Vice President Dick Cheney to be the commencement speaker.

The reporter�s central point seems to be that inviting the vice president � presumably this particular vice president � is inconsistent with the Church�s often-stated political neutrality.

The other article � in the same newspaper � is an editorial that urges that the vice president be allowed to speak because �this is democracy at work� and that an audience of college graduates is capable of assessing what he says. The newspaper further says that the decision was for the BYU board of trustees to make, �just as it is the right of anyone who disagrees with the choice to say so.�

Let�s take a look at what the Church�s political neutrality policy is.

First, the Church prohibits any Church leader from endorsing a candidate in the name of the Church. In the American political process, endorsement means officially putting the weight of an institution or individual behind a political candidate � publicly giving unequivocal support to the candidate�s policies and platform.

Second, the Church bans the use of its chapels for party political purposes and also refuses to allow the distribution of Church membership rolls to anyone, including politicians and candidates.

It also carefully avoids telling its members for whom they should vote. Neither does it tell elected Latter-day Saint officials how they should vote.

Such a policy makes sense in a Church that operates in more than 160 countries and with a global membership that embraces many different political persuasions and views. But the policy is also a reflection of what Church leaders see as the organization�s central mission � to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. To engage in partisan politics or to take up every social cause would be to divert the Church from that mission.