Huckabee apologizes for comments on Mormons

WASHINGTON (CNN)

— Republican Mike Huckabee Wednesday personally apologized to rival

Mitt Romney for comments he made in an upcoming New York Times Magazine

article that appear to disparage the Mormon faith.

GOP hopeful Mike Huckabee's campaign says his comments on Mormons were taken out of context.The former Arkansas governor said he apologized to Romney after the GOP debate in Johnston, Iowa.

\"I said, I would never try, ever to try to somehow pick out some point

of your faith and make it an issue, and I wouldn't,\" Huckabee said.

\"I've stayed away from talking about Mitt Romney's faith,\" Huckabee

said. \"I told him face-to-face, I said I don't think your being a

Mormon ought to make you more or less qualified for being a president.\"

In the article, a preview of which is posted on the New York Times Web

site, the former Arkansas governor is quoted as asking, \"Don't Mormons

believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?\" 

The remark came after New York Times reporter Zev Chafets asked

Huckabee whether he thought Mormonism was a religion or a cult.

Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, said he thought it was the former

but conceded he doesn't \"know much about it.\" The article is to appear

in Sunday's paper.

Asked how Romney responded to the apology, Huckabee said the Massachusetts Republican was \"gracious.\"

\"The governor accepted the apology,\" Romney spokesman Kevin Madden

said. \"He continues to believe that this campaign should not be about

questioning a candidate's faith. While it is fair to criticize an

opponent's record or policy positions, it is out of bounds for one

candidate to question another's personal faith.\"