How Mitt Romney can help save America

Over the months of Mitt Romney's campaign for the presidency, I've heard a few Mormons grumble that it was awfully selfish of Brother Romney to bring all the anti-Mormon bigots out of the woodwork, solely to satisfy his political ambitions.

All that anti-Mormon stuff could only hurt the missionary work!

I heard just as many people whispering hints about how his candidacy might be fulfilment of the prophecy about the Constitution hanging by a thread and the Elders of Israel saving it.

The first attitude bothered me because it implied that no Mormon should ever run for public office outside of the Mormon corridor, because political opponents from the right and the left always will exploit anti-Mormon attitudes and ideas.

In the real world, there is no bad publicity for the church. Here's why: Hate-filled attacks on the church, as well as ridicule of our doctrines, actually provide opportunities for the Spirit to touch people's hearts.

I've known converts who were first drawn to the church because of anti-Mormon propaganda. Their attitude? "If clowns like this are attacking the Mormon Church so angrily, there must be something to their doctrines!"

As a church and a people, we've endured far worse and thrived anyway.

As to seeing the fulfilment of prophecy in Mitt Romney's candidacy, I can't deny the possibility. But I can also tell you that just because a candidate is LDS does not imply that his policies will save anything.

If a Mormon candidate has positions on the most important issues that I consider to be wrong, and his non-Mormon opponent is right on those issues, then maybe I'll be one of those "elders of Israel" saving the Constitution by voting for the non-Mormon candidate!

There were things I liked about Romney's candidacy, and things I hated — but they all had to do with his own actions and decisions, and had little to do with the fact that he and I are both Mormons.

Of course, as a Mormon, I actively worked to dispel negative myths about the church and to confront and, I hoped, allay the fears of evangelical Christians who have been exposed to anti-Mormon propaganda for decades.

At the same time, I loathed his decision to exploit the bigotry that drives the anti-illegal-immigrant movement. Here's the sad thing: It didn't even work.

Even in states where Republican anti-immigrant feeling runs high, the polls showed that of those voters who thought illegal immigration was the No. 1 issue, Romney got only about half.