If an Islamic Jihadist was running for office, would you say his faith is irrelevant? I don’t think so. No, you have to look at the whole person, and a person’s faith generally is a foundation for his or her world view.

NJ Gop

Right. The world view. I am not going to vote for a socialist world view, or a tax and spend world view, nor a victim world view. But forgive me. I grew up steeped and scalded up to fatal burns in religion. I am intimately acquainted with a Lutheran minister that thinks our post-his-marriage tryst was not wrong. I don’t think his theology is really impacting his world view, do you?

To find God, I had to leave religion. I have a jaundiced view of someone that make a political point of their religion, and an especially jaundiced view of their opponents who do.

Kindly do not miss the point; that being there are enough issues that actually count more than theology as a deal killer.

JMJ

Sorry NJ, everything you said had to do with a moral world view and not primarily a religious one. As such, how “faithful” you are to your wife and how ethical you are with a company has NOTHING to do with religion. Now I know that there are religious people out there who, for whatever reason I cannot understand, believe morality and religion are the same thing. As someone who considers himself highly religious myself, I do not believe theology means morality. Often I have even seen theology used as an excuse to be anything other than moral or ethical.

If I misunderstand what you say, I can only think of one other way to take your discussion. It is true that how a religious organization thinks and behaves can determine predictability of individuals who belong. However, I believe there are very few instances where theology can determine anything other than what a person believes. That is because there can be so many different ways that individuals within the respective religious organizations can interpret their own theology. Frankly, theology is not very practical other than as a determination of the different denominations that exist. More important is how religious people treat others who don’t believe as they do. That is a better indicator of how a person will govern than what they believe about the nature of God and Eternal destiny in most instances.

Ethical people tend to draw ethical people to their team; and a no tolerance policy toward irregularities may not make your organization bullet-proof, but it sure helps.

If you don’t have a person of solid character then you have nothing. I distinctly remember when Clinton was running in the primaries and the whole infidelity thing broke in the news. My reaction then was that if this guy can’t be faithful to his wife, whom he stood before God and swore to be faithful to, how faithful is he going to be to the voters?

It makes a difference.

Sorry this has nothing to do with your current entry, but I just noticed your request on my Bullfrog-at-Townhall-dot-com to consider linking to this blog of yours. Done. I linked here from Bullfrog. I have a couple of WordPress blogs, but neither is devoted to politics.

Jane, aka Bullfrog

I have heard vague explanations from people that claim some grand Mormon conspiracy to take over the U.S. and then the World. They never fully explain what that conspiracy is or how it is to be accomplished. Most of the specific explanations that are given are the exact same beliefs as those who are critical. In other words, its like those who criticize over the supposed “conspiracy” are angry because they have competition for something they want themselves.

For instance, I used to believe all the Liberal accusations that the Religious Right were trying to set up a Theocracy rather than Democracy in the United States was hogwash. They wanted a more moral society based on decency, self-control, and family values. Since Romney has gotten into the Presidential race, I am not as sure Theocracy isn’t the goal. Although some high positioned conservative leaders have backed Romney, many have not because he isn’t “Christian” according to how they define the word. That goes doubly so for many rank and file. Often times it comes down to “do you want a Christian for Pres. or not?” That is a literal question. No others need apply. That sounds like theocracy to me. And people are worried about Mormonism?

Romney should be the Conservative choice (as one possible reason) because such support can both repudiate the theocratic inclination of the Religious Right and still remain within the values of the Republican Party.

I have heard good thing about Romney, but never really heard from him. So far, I have not been impressed either way…but I have had little exposure to him. But if anything, his Mormon faith affiliation means he is strong on family values, which is a definite positive in his column, as whatever you may believe, the strength of families is still the most important influence in our society. My more faith based cohorts should take note of this before they rush to judgement based on his spiritual beliefs.