Romney strikes rare notes of faith in Aurora speech

CNN ^ | July 20, 2012 | Eric Marrapodi and Halimah Abdullah

[greyfoxx39]

In a speech to a wounded nation, presidential hopeful Mitt Romney returned to his roots of faith in the face of a national tragedy.

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The Bible-laden references in Romney's speech also signal to evangelicals who worry about his Mormon faith that he is drawing from a familiar text.

"I think he's growing more comfortable and today's speech is further evidence of that, talking about his faith in the public arena," said Tony Perkins, the head of the Family Research Council.

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There are still undoubtedly theological tensions between Mormons and evangelicals that won't be resolved in the presidential campaign.

"Most of the evangelicals think Mormons are going to hell and they aren't Christians," said Clyde Wilcox, a political science professor at Georgetown University who co-wrote "Onward Christian Soldiers?: The Religious Right in American Politics." "What he's saying is there is a commonality of faith and shared values."

According to a Gallup Poll in June, bias against a Mormon presidential candidate hasn't budged in 45 years, with 18% of Americans saying they would not vote for a well-qualified candidate who was Mormon.

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"Moments like these call for our commander in chief to act as a theologian in chief, and Romney did that today," said Stephen Prothero, a religion professor at Boston University and the author of the American Bible.

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"The speech would be completely at home in a Mormon meeting and yet was carefully ecumenical," added Kristine Haglund, the editor of Dialogue.

[HiTech RedNeck]

it was both, a tragetrocity.

[madison10]

Hateful...and I do NOT mean Romney.

[HiTech RedNeck]

This is going to be an interesting pickle, as Mitt is virtually certain to mop the floor with Obama this November and take the White House.

Every time Mitt says something about God and America with the exact same words that the Christian (Methodist) George W. Bush would also have said, there will be a clamor of condemnation that wouldn’t have even been leveled at the deist Benjamin Franklin. But if Mitt remains mute about the matter, others will complain about how secular he is.