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National Review Endorses Romney

by American Phoenix | January 8, 2008

My friend Moonage writes that he is unimpressed with the National Review’s endorsement of Mitt Romney for President.

I must respectfully disagree.

First of all, Oprah’s endorsement carries far less weight than does the National Review’s editorial board - particularly with conservatives. While I enjoy Oprah’s show and I applaud her humanitarian and philanthropic work, there are issues on which I believe she is wrong and which reflect the lack of knowledge on which her conclusions are sometimes based. Her initial support of James Frey is a case in point. Her support for feel good books/movies like The Secret likewise smacks of emotionalism. Oprah is a relative lightweight when compared to the intellectual firepower that the National Review offers.

While William F. Buckley, Jr. has written several articles over the past few years with which I have similarly disagreed, I think it is important to point out that he is not the entire editorial board. It is the editorial board that is endorsing Romney - not Buckley. It should also be noted that Buckley is no longer the editor-in-chief of the National Review. That job has been ceded to Rich Lowry, although Buckley remains on the editorial board.

I agree with Captain’s Quarters that the National Review’s endorsement of Romney will mean more to conservatives than most others. It certainly means more than Pat Robertson’s endorsement of Giuliani. Robertson never had the intellectual breadth that William F. Buckley, Jr. has, let alone the entire editorial board of the National Review. I also agree with the National Review’s assessment that Giuliani and Huckabee will pull the party apart from opposite ends:

Uniting the conservative coalition is not enough to win a presidential election, but it is a prerequisite for building on that coalition. Rudolph Giuliani did extraordinary work as mayor of New York and was inspirational on 9/11. But he and Mike Huckabee would pull apart the coalition from opposite ends: Giuliani alienating the social conservatives, and Huckabee the economic (and foreign-policy) conservatives. A Republican party that abandoned either limited government or moral standards would be much diminished in the service it could give the country.

Huckabee is soft on immigration, apparently also soft on law enforcement, and raised taxes while governor, despite his conservative views on social issues. Giuliani is a social liberal who has demonstrated support for gay marriage and abortion, while at the same time demonstrating weaknesses in immigration, despite his reputation as a fiscal conservative and his leadership during the September 11th attacks. Moreover, Giuliani’s personal life is a mess and his recommendation of Bernard Kerik does not promote confidence in his good judgment. There are many conservatives, like myself, who will not vote for Giuliani because of his stands on social issues. There are other conservatives who will not vote for Huckabee because of his poor record on fiscal issues.

Conservatives may be able to coalesce around Romney. Nevertheless, social conservatives should remain cautious. As Jill Stanek points out, although Romney is pro-life, his stand on embryonic stem cell research permits some abortions. Quoting a Romney interview with Katie Couric, Stanek writes:

Romney: Yes, those embryos that are referred to commonly as surplus embryos from in-vitro fertilization. Those embryos, I hope, could be available for adoption for people who would like to adopt embryos. But if a parent decides they would want to donate one of those embryos for purposes of research, in my view, that’s acceptable. It should not be made against the law. I wouldn’t finance that with government money because it represents a moral challenge for a lot of people and I think we’re better investing in places where the prospects are much better. And I think that’s something like something known as alter-nuclear transfer where you create new embryo, like, entities, but they’re not human embryos. And you can take stem cells from those.

No. A parent cannot authorize killing a child. A parent cannot donate his/her living child for scientific experimentation.

As Jimmy Akin has also previously pointed out, Mitt Romney’s pro-life stance may not be all that firm. Similarly, Gerald Augustinus notes at The Cafeteria is Closed that Mormonism’s stance on racial equality is softer than the Christian ideal:

While the Catholic Church had its own segregation issues (It was just over a century ago that the first black priest who’d studied in the USA was ordained, before, they went to Rome), many schools were segregated and so forth. Nonetheless, the Church often went to great lengths to educate black children, and racism wasn’t/isn’t part of doctrine. Mormonism’s situation is quite different. From the Wall Street Journal:

In an “Official Declaration” issued on June 8, 1978, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints extended “priesthood and temple blessings to all worthy male members of the Church.” The church announced that a “revelation had been received” by its then-president Spencer Kimball. Until then, Mormonism was a defiantly apartheid faith that denied blacks full participation based on doctrinal beliefs that whites are “pure” and “delightsome,” while black-skinned people are “unrighteous,” “despised” and “loathsome” descendants of the biblical Cain, who was cursed for killing Abel.

…

Mormon leaders were applauded for finally ending the prohibition. But … the church has never repudiated the teachings that supported the policy. In 2004, he wrote, “ironically, the doctrinal folklore that many of us thought had been discredited, or at least made moot, through the 1978 revelation, continued to appear . . . [in church literature] written well after 1978 and continues to be taught by well-meaning teachers and leaders in the church to this very day.” And “Mormon America,” which was just re-released, notes plainly that “Mormon teaching against race-mixing remains in force.”

To be fair, Romney has never done or said anything, at least that I have heard, that would indicate that he supports racial inequality. In fact, he has said that he was glad that the Mormon Church finally opened up the priesthood to black people. But because of Mormonism’s tepid pro-life stance and because Romney is a Mormon, Jimmy Akin also points out that a significant, though small, percentage of the evangelical vote will not vote for Romney. Akin also asks some hard questions about how Romney’s Mormon faith will inform his policy decisions:

And isn’t it legitimate, since Romney says values from his Mormon faith will influence his decisions, to ask about the precise details of those values. If the Mormon church is softer on abortion than it should be (and it is), what does that say about Romney. Isn’t it legitimate to ask follow-up questions of Romney about the extent to which he shares his church’s position on abortion and what he would do on this question in office?

…

Something conspicuously absent from almost all press reporting on the controversy over Romney’s religion is the fact that Mormons are polytheists. That is, they believe in multiple gods. They also believe that men can become gods (and women can become goddesses).

This is a radically different vision of God and man than that taught by the Christian faith. It cuts out and replaces the central doctrine of Christianity–its understanding of God and man–and replaces it with an alien one.

Before the inevitable barrage of outrage that anyone would dare to say that Mormons aren’t Christian, it would be appropriate to first put the shoe on the other foot, as Fr. Richard John Neuhaus writes in First Things:

Asking whether Mormonism is Christian or Mormons are Christians (a slightly different question) is thought to be insulting. “How can you ask that,” protests a Mormon friend, “when we clearly love the Lord Jesus as much as we do?” It is true that St. Paul says that nobody can say “Jesus is Lord” except by the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:3). But that only indicates that aspects of Mormon faith are touched by the Holy Spirit, as is every element of truth no matter where it is found. A Mormon academic declares that asking our question “is a bit like asking if African Americans are human.” No, it is not even a bit like that. “Christian” in this context is not honorific but descriptive. Nobody questions whether Mormons are human. To say that Jews, Muslims, or Buddhists are not Christians is no insult. It is a statement of fact, indeed of respect for their difference. The question is whether that is a fact and a difference that applies also to Mormonism.

The question as asked by Mormons is turned around: are non-Mormons who claim to be Christians in fact so? The emphatic and repeated answer of the Mormon scriptures and the official teaching of the LDS is that we are not. We are members of “the great and abominable church” that was built by frauds and impostors after the death of the first apostles. The true church and true Christianity simply went out of existence, except for its American Indian interlude, until it was rediscovered and reestablished by Joseph Smith in upstate New York, and its claims will be vindicated when Jesus returns, sooner rather than later, at a prophetically specified intersection in Jackson County, Missouri. (emphasis added)

David Kuo puts it more succinctly:

More importantly, the fundamental tenets of Mormonism are not compatible with 2,000 years of Christian theology. This is NOT a statement of religious intolerance, it is a statement of theological fact. Mormon theology is in opposition to such basic Christian creeds like the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed. Mormonism uses the language of Christianity but it is not a Christian religion.

More to the point, Christian baptism requires four elements to be considered valid: the proper form, the proper matter (substance), correct intention of the minister and the correct disposition of the recipient. Mormon baptism is not considered Christian because it fails three of these tests:

The only part of the four part test which Mormon baptism meets is use of the proper form, i.e., baptism by immersion in water. This is why the official position of the Catholic Church, in response to this question, is that Mormon baptism is not a valid Christian baptism.

The vast majority of American Christians - either Catholic or Protestant - do not understand these fundamental differences in what the Christian vs. Mormon churches teach. However, Romney’s candidacy may and hopefull will spark Christians to learn more about what the Mormon church actually teaches and how it is different from what Christian churches teach. This will - and should - give Christians who are considering voting for Romney some concern. Nevertheless, as Fr. Neuhaus points out, Mormonism is unintelligible apart from Christianity:

Much of the teaching reflects the liberal Protestantism of the time, even the Transcendental and Gnostic fevers that were in the air: e.g., a God in process of becoming, progressive revelation, the denial of original sin, and an unbridled optimism about the perfectibility of man.

…

Yet Mormonism is inexplicable apart from Christianity and the peculiar permutations of Protestant Christianity in nineteenth-century America. It may in this sense be viewed as a Christian derivative. It might be called a Christian heresy, except heresy is typically a deviation within the story of the Great Tradition that Mormonism rejects tout court. Or Mormonism may be viewed as a Christian apostasy….

[Joseph Smith] knew, of course, that he was rejecting the Christianity of normative tradition….

Some have suggested that the LDS is a Christian derivative much as Christianity is a Jewish derivative, but that is surely wrong. The claim of Christianity is that its gospel of Jesus Christ is in thorough continuity with the Old Testament and historic Israel, that the Church is the New Israel, which means that it is the fulfillment of the promise that Israel would be “a light to the nations.” The Church condemned Marcion’s rejection of the Old Testament, and she never presumed to rewrite or correct the Hebrew Scriptures on the basis of a new revelation. On the contrary, she insisted that the entirety of the old covenant bears witness to the new. While it is a Christian derivative, the LDS is, by way of sharpest contrast, in radical discontinuity with historic Christianity. The sacred stories and official teachings of the LDS could hardly be clearer about that. For missionary and public relations purposes, the LDS may present Mormonism as an “add-on,” a kind of Christianity-plus, but that is not the official narrative and doctrine.

Thus, one who holds to the tenets of Mormonism must reject Christianity at the same time the “true” aspects of Christianity are retained. Mormons must make reference to the same Christianity that they reject. It is therefore no surprise that in Romney’s recent speech on religion, he makes reference to Christ:

What do I believe about Jesus Christ? I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the Savior of mankind.

We now understand that this means something much different to a Mormon than it does to a Christian. The direct parallel to Romney’s speech on religion is, as has been duly noted just about everywhere in the media, the speech John F. Kennedy gave in 1960. I think La Nouvelle Theologie is correct in its assessment:

As Catholics we have been dealing with JFK’s abandonment of his Catholic faith in the public square for last 40+ years. Consider the Kennedy brothers, Gov. Mauro Cuomo and a host of current political candidates for President like Sen. Joe Biden and former NYC major Rudy Giuliani. They claim to be Catholics but in political office endorse and vote for positions which are clearly contradictory with Church teachings. Either what the Church teaches is true or its not, for example refer to the issue of the sanctity of human life regarding embryonic stem-cell research, abortion and euthanasia. If one believes what the Church teaches is true than you must work towards means (various prudential political or legals acts) which value and recognize those truths. If one publicly claims to be Catholic in a desire to reap the benefits of other Catholics voting for you than you should vote in accordance with or towards what the Church teaches regarding social ethics.

It is clear to me that Fmr. Gov. Mitt Romney “wants his cake and eat it too.” He publicly states he is a practicing and active Mormon but will not allow his religious beliefs impact how he governs as President. From an ontological perspective this is impossible. Your personal faith should impact how you live and act publicly. A person’s conscience is formed by what your religion teaches, and if it doesn’t it should if you truly believe it.

But, as Fr. Neuhaus has very wittily written:

Few Catholics believe that a candidate is disqualified by being a Mormon. The reason is obvious: Catholics are accustomed to having heretics in the White House. Jews likewise are not offended that the president is not one of their own. This is and always has been a dominantly Protestant country. With the exception of JFK, who, sad to say, was not much of a Catholic, Catholics are accustomed to having presidents who are, in their view, religiously wrongheaded.

The question is: Is Mormonism just another Christian heresy? Given what I have learned, I must answer that question in the negative. It is a substantially different religion, just as Islam is substantially different from Christianity.

I must confess, however, that what concerns me about the Mormon Church in the context of Romney’s run for the Presidency may not be the same things that other Christians are concerned about. At a time when the institution of marriage is under attack, the Mormon Church’s position on polygamy, like its teachings on racial equality and abortion, are also softer than I would like.

This is both for historical and doctrinal reasons. Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism, was married to 33 wives, though he kept his polygamy (more accurately polygyny; polyandry was never allowed) secret because he knew that he would face opposition from his followers. The justification for Smith’s polygamy was that he had received a revelation from God commanding him to do so. When his polygamy became public knowledge, he did face opposition and, in fact, this played a part in the circumstances surrounding his murder. His successor, Brigham Young, who maintained the practice of polygamy in public had 55 wives.

The practice of polygamy was ultimately outlawed in 1862, when Abraham Lincoln signed into law the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act which was later upheld by the United States Supreme Court in Reynolds v. U.S. There were several decades in which the Mormons fought the federal government over the issue of polygamy, but when it became clear that the federal government was serious about enforcement and the Mormon Church stood to lose its property over the issue and Utah would be prohibited from attaining statehood while polygamy was legal, Mormons changed course. In 1890, President Wilford Woodruff issued a “manifesto” stating that future polygamous marriages would not be recognized on the basis of revelations that he allegedly received from Jesus Christ.

This teaching became more accepted over time, nevertheless there still exist splinter groups, such as the FLDS, which maintain the practice of polygamy. These groups maintain the practice of polygamy because they believe that they are restoring authentic LDS doctrines. Brigham Young, in fact, taught that polygamy was a prerequisite of both avoiding damnation and becoming gods. One might enter the “Celestial Kingdom” without being a polygamist, but the possibility of having an eternal family would apparently not exist at all. They also point to Abraham’s multiple wives as justification for polygamy, while at the same time apparently ignoring Christ’s teaching on marriage (Matthew 19:3-12).

As I have written previously here and here, the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Lawrence v. Texas already opens the door to those who would advocate the legalization of polygamy within our society, and polygamists have already brought suit to do just that.

If Romney were to become President of the United States, this would perhaps give encouragement to extreme splinter groups such as the FLDS, which maintain Mormon teaching on polygamy. Now that there is literally no chance that Mormon polygamists will be prosecuted for polygamy, or that the Mormon Church will lose its property on account of its teaching on polygamy, there is very little incentive to maintain the religious prohibition on polygamy. This, in turn, has the potential to open up America in a concrete cultural way, by further weakening the institution of marriage and monogamy, to Islam.

It should be noted that there are other interesting theological parallels between Mormonism and Islam, which have been written about in Are Mormons and Muslims Apples and Oranges? An Apologetic Assessment of the Similarities and Differences by Robert Velarde and Eric Johnson:

Fr. Neuhaus also notes parallels with Islam:

A closer parallel might be with Islam. Islam is a derivative of Judaism and Christianity. Like Joseph Smith, Muhammad in the seventh century claimed new revelations and produced in the Qur’an a “corrected” version of the Jewish and Christian scriptures, presumably by divine dictation. Few dispute that Islam is a new and another religion, and Muslims do not claim to be Christian, although they profess a deep devotion to Jesus. Like Joseph Smith and his followers, they do claim to be the true children of Abraham. Christians in dialogue with Islam understand it to be an interreligious, not an ecumenical, dialogue. Ecumenical dialogue is dialogue between Christians. Dialogue with Mormons who represent official LDS teaching is interreligious dialogue.

But this is not just theological posturing. This exposition of Mormonism’s differences with Christianity is not mere mental masturbation, for theology - what people believe - has an effect on our lives and culture. Mormon theology has a connection with the practice of polygamy and polygamy in turn has a direct and negative effect on human rights. Interestingly, the rationale that Republicans used to outlaw polygamy in 1862 had to do with its connection to barbarism and slavery. I have written previously about the connection between crime and the denial of basic human rights to women living in polygamous Mormon households.

Such violations are far from uncommon in polygamous households; rather, they are the norm. The Utah and Arizona Offices of the Attorney General have issued a primer on polygamy-related crimes and issues which include:

  • Statutory rape (sex with an underage minor, usually a girl);
  • Child abuse, including incest;
  • Truancy related to children being prohibited from receiving a high school education;
  • Welfare fraud;
  • Incest, including “marriages” of first cousins;
  • Domestic violence;
  • Murder (when women attempt to leave polygamous relationships, they are often looked upon as sinners and apostates requiring “blood atonement”);
  • Arranged marriages lacking consent;
  • Lack of availability of father to children in polygamous arrangements where wives have different households;
  • Inequality of women and children, who are treated as chattel property.

Oddly, the link to The Primer is broken on the Utah Attorney General’s website, but it can still be found online. It makes for very interesting reading. Much the same can be said of polygamy within the Islamic world.

Christians who are truly committed to human rights and who are familiar with the effects of polygamy, both in Mormon sects and within Islam, do not want to see the practice of polygamy legitimized, for it would eventually mean the abolition of one aspect of Christian freedom that is so distinctive - and so hard won.

Another aspect of the Christian ideal of freedom is democracy, which Christianity rescued from classical Greek and Roman civilization along with democratic notions of the limited role of government.

And, as the Rev. Sirico has written, it is another aspect of this same Christian ideal of freedom that has limited government intrusion into our lives:

Similarly, it was the churches before and after the American Revolution which said no to the leviathan state, precisely because it had intruded into areas that more properly belong to religious authority. The churches didn’t merely mind their own business; they spoke to the whole of society, and we should be thankful for that.

Maybe we are not accustomed to thinking of religion as a limit on government. But this has largely been so and continues to be so. It was the Catholic Church that beat back communism in Eastern Europe and just last week prevented dictatorship in Venezuela. In our own country, the churches are the main protectors of religious liberty, for they tend to resist intrusion by the state at every level.

To the extent that the Mormon church lays claim to be - and actually is - Christian, the Mormon Church may resist state intrusion into the private sphere. But perhaps the most embarrassing issue is really that there isn’t a strong Christian conservative running in this race. (No, I don’t consider Huckabee a conservative.)

Nevertheless, while Romney’s Mormon faith is not necessarily a reason not to vote for him for President, it’s not a reason to vote FOR him either. Interestingly, the National Catholic Register has written a favorable editorial on Romney, albeit not an endorsement. When one goes to the polls, a person votes FOR something - not against something. My friend Stormwarning has mentioned other issues:

Romney has said, “If the answer for leading the country is someone that has a lot of foreign policy experience, we can just go down to the State Department” and pick one. Excuse me? I’ve already made the point that a number of candidates have clue about our enemy. IMO, this statement disqualifies Romney for the office of POTUS.

Its no secret that of all of the Republican candidates for President, I favor Senator McCain. I know that taking that position disqualifies me as a conservative, but then again, I’ve never claimed to be a conservative.

I don’t think this disqualifies Romney from the Presidency, but I do think that he was being glib. Too glib, to be sure. Nevertheless, I appreciate the points that Romney was trying to make: that an expert in one area may not have the breadth of knowledge required to be President, and that foreign policy isn’t the only reason to elect a President. Still, we live in a dangerous world that, in all likelihood, will get more dangerous in the coming decade. No President will be able to prevent this, but he or she will have to be able to meet the challenge and this requires a knowledge of foreign affairs, even if not expertise.

Romney has won the Republican primary in Wyoming (which is not really a surprise since Wyoming has a large Mormon population). He came in second in the Iowa caucases and second in the New Hampshire primary that was decided this evening. The coming primaries will help all of us further determine more fully which Republican candidate has the requisite foreign policy accumen and, not incidentally, the best candidate for the job.

Update - January 10, 2008: I recently read that Justice Robert Bork has endorsed Romney. Regardless of one’s personal feelings about the National Review endorsement, I think Bork’s endorsement will carry quite a bit of weight with conservatives who want to see strict constructionists appointed to the courts. I think it’s interesting that Bork did not endorse Giuliani, which tells me that Giuliani wasn’t able to pull the wool over Bork’s eyes like he did Pat Robertson.

Topics: Abortion, Catechetics, Christianity, Culture, Family, History, Law, Politics, Polygamy, Religion |

2 Responses to “National Review Endorses Romney”

  1. MoonageNo Gravatar Says:
    January 8th, 2008 at 7:46 pm

    My view on that post is that I am unimpressed with Buckley and the National Review. Just to be perfectly clear, it does not reflect any opinion I have on Romney. He’s as good a candidate as all the rest. And, I think he’ll be voted up or down based on his credentials and popularity. My only point was National Review has alienated a lot of people such as myself with their targeted attacks of conservatives they don’t agree with. As such, their endorsement is a double-edged sword that leads to what I think is negating any impact they might have had. Given, of course, a person reads National Review on a regular basis. If they don’t and the wow-factor of Buckley means anything, it will mean something to those voters. Regardless of who’s managing their shop, Buckley is synonomous to National Review whether they like it or not.

    The rest of your post is ground I dare not tread. I think about the only religion I would have a problem with right now is Muslim. It’s just too aggressive of a religion for me to feel safe with right now. Other than that, having a Catholic, Southern Baptist, or Mormon as president is irrelevent to me. Well, Scientologists would probably get nixed as well. They just seem a little too loony to me. :)

  2. American Phoenix Says:
    February 1st, 2008 at 3:13 pm

    Oswald Sobrino: McCain is a True Conservative…

    Oswald Sobrino over at Catholic Analysis thinks John McCain is a “true conservative”. He is supporting John McCain in the presidential race.
    I have one question: Are you kidding me?
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