Privately devout Mitt Romney worships with his family

WOLFEBORO, N.H. — Every year, Mitt Romney and his family spend a week at his estate on picturesque Lake Winnipesaukee. They go boating, play games — and attend church, an expression of the faith that's fundamentally shaped the Republican presidential candidate.

Romney, the first Mormon to clinch the presidential nomination of a major party, attended services Sunday with his wife, Ann, five sons, five daughters-in-law and 18 grandchildren. They made up nearly a third of the congregation that gathered inside the small, nondescript building that houses this tiny resort town's branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

The Romney clan has attended the church in Wolfeboro many times before — only now the family patriarch carries the distinction of being President Barack Obama's Republican challenger.

Not that church leaders or worshippers mentioned the new reality as, one by one, they stood at a podium to offer testimony, a custom in Mormon churches on the first Sunday of every month. Among those testifying: one of the many Romney grandchildren.

"My name is Chloe Romney and I'm visiting here from California," the candidate's middle-school-age granddaughter said from the church's lectern, a pink flower in her hair. "I know that my family loves me and I like to go to church."

The family's devotion to the Mormon faith is a part of Romney's life that the electorate rarely sees. Romney almost never mentions it in public. And his campaign typically bars the media from seeing him participate in a religion that many Americans are unfamiliar with. But it's a part of his life that could help him connect with a public that's just now getting to get to know him — one that includes many church-goers.

Romney's campaign doesn't tell reporters when Romney is going to church. But the Wolfeboro branch is open to visitors and an Associated Press reporter attended the same sacrament service the Romney family attended. It featured bread with water instead of wine, a variation on communion that allows for the Mormon prohibition on drinking alcohol.

And it provided a rare glimpse into his practice of a faith that has permeated every aspect of Romney's life: his childhood, his college years and time as a missionary, his marriage, his life in Boston, even his business career.

Mormonism began in the 1830s when, according to believers, an angel presented another book of scripture to Joseph Smith, the church's founder, called the Book of Mormon. With 14.4 million members, the church is among the fastest growing in the world, supported by a full-time missionary force of about 55,000 young people. Romney has been an active Mormon all his life, so involved in the church at one point that he rose to a rank equivalent to a bishop. He eventually presided over a group of congregations.

During his presidential campaign, the demands of Romney's faith can dictate how he spends his time; it requires as many as three hours nearly every Sunday for services. According to people familiar with his private schedule, Romney goes to church nearly every week. His faith also helps drive his fundraising; a significant amount of money comes from wealthy Mormon donors. And Mormon households across the country often housed campaign aides as they moved from state to state during the GOP primary.

When Romney does talk about his faith, he discloses little and usually focuses on his time as a missionary in France. He offered a forceful explanation of the role of faith in his own life during a recent speech at Liberty University that was aimed at bridging differences with evangelicals, many of whom are skeptical of Mormon theology.