"HE HASN'T BEEN MORMON ENOUGH"

From The Guardian
London, England

By Daniel Nasaw in Washington

While Mitt Romney's speech on his Mormon faith this morning played to evangelicals by describing the role his religion should play in public policy, it was unlikely to sway social conservative voters uneasy with his socially liberal background.

The speech was meant to address fears that he would take policy cues from Mormon church leaders, and that his religion is a cult that is unacceptable to Christian conservative voters.

But many social conservative voters are less concerned with the specifics of the former Massachusetts governor's religious creed than his sympathetic record on abortion rights.

"I don't think Romney's problem has anything to do with Mormonism," said Jerry Zandstra, a Michigan anti-abortion activist and pastor who supports Arizona Senator John McCain for the Republican presidential nomination. "I have no problem with him being a Mormon. It's his positions that are ever-shifting and problematic."

For instance, Romney now says he's firmly anti-abortion, but while running for office in Massachusetts, he said, "I believe women should have the right to make their own choice."

Another Michigan social-conservative activist said Romney's declaration that "Americans do not respect believers of convenience" was an "indictment" of his own political background.

"The risk he runs is being judged as a 'believer of convenience' in the public policy arena," said Gary Glenn, president of the American Family Association of Michigan.

"It's not that he's Mormon, it's that he hasn't been Mormon enough in the public policy arena."

Mormons are typically vehemently socially conservative and anti-abortion.

Massachusetts voters, who chose him 50%-45%, are far more liberal than the Republican Iowa caucus-goers he sought to woo today. In Iowa, evangelical Christians make up an estimated 35% to 50% of caucus-goers. The Iowa caucuses are January 3.

The speech was billed in the media as the 2007 Republican version of John F Kennedy's speech to a group of protestant ministers in Houston in 1960. In that address Kennedy declared that he was an American running for president who happens to be Catholic, not a Catholic running for president who would take orders from the Vatican.

Romney's speech stuck to a dramatically different theme, and included some key talking points of the Christian right.

"It was not JFK's ringing endorsement of church-state separation", said Peter Montgomery, a spokesman for People for the American Way, a liberal advocacy group. "He's trying to assure [Christian conservatives] 'I'm one of you,' in order to get their vote."

Romney also referred directly to the cultural battles in which conservatives are perpetually engaged, saying God should remain on our currency, in our pledge, in the teaching of our history and during the holiday season, nativity scenes and menorahs should be welcome in our public places.

"Some of what he said was meant to play directly to some of the concerns in the culture wars," said Martin Medhurst, a professor of rhetoric at Baylor University in Waco, Texas . The message , Medhurst said: "I'm on your side."

Romney said he refused to offer doctrinal details of his Mormon religion.

"He's basically shut that off," said John Green, Senior Fellow at Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. Green said by doing so, he avoids the risk doctrinal differences will put off Christian voters. "That's an argument he probably can't win."

Instead, Romney embraced what Green called "American civil religion, the idea that American politics and government are based on universal religious values." "He's trying to stake out a positive role in religion," Green said.

It's unlikely, however, that he convinced evangelicals they're cut from the same cloth.

"I don't think his Mormonism is a deal breaker for most Americans, but only Mitt Romney can close the deal," Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, told ABC television's Good Morning America. Asked directly if he thought Mormons were Christians, Land said, "No, I do not."

Medhurst said the speech was a defensive play intended to staunch the flow of wavering Iowa evangelicals from his camp to former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee. Huckabee, an ordained Baptist minister, has overtaken Romney in some Iowa polls and is gaining ground nationally.

Marvin Olasky, provost of The King's College, a Christian liberal arts school in New York City, said Romney will have a tough time persuading evangelical voters that Mormon church priorities will not help shape his public policy.

Romney's avowal of his belief in Jesus' divinity is "necessary, but not sufficient," Medhurst said. Romney will now have to meet with evangelical leaders and win their endorsement, he said.