by Mark Silva
COLLEGE STATION, Texas – Republican Mitt Romney has raised many millions of dollars in a bid for the presidency, invested millions more of his own and has claimed enviable positions in the premier caucus and primary contests of Iowa and New Hampshire.
But now he confronts a question that may pose the greatest obstacle to his candidacy, his religion.
In an era when the religious right asserts considerable influence in American elections, the fact that Romney, a Mormon, will come to Texas on Thursday to articulate his vision of “Faith in America’’ is a measure of just how much sway evangelical Christians may hold in next year’s voting – particularly in the Republican Party’s naming of a presidential nominee.
It is a measure, too, of the role that religion plays in the American civic arena. Voters approach the question somewhat ambiguously: Most tell pollsters they want a president with faith in God, yet most want a White House free of any dogma.
In the balance hang questions of a federal marriage amendment, which Romney and some other Republicans support, abortion rights, which Romney has come to oppose after a personal conversion, and appointments of Supreme Court justices who will not write law, which Romney and fellow Republicans promise.
Yet faith itself may the unspoken issue on the ballot.
Nearly two hundred years after a 14-year-old named Joseph Smith retreated to a wooded grove and prayed to know which church was true – and emerged with his reported revelation from the Lord “that all the religious denominations were believing in incorrect doctrines’’ – the Book of Mormon and Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have staked solid roots with one of the most united yet least understood faiths in America.
Yet, 47 years after a Catholic named John F. Kennedy traveled to Texas to confront a fundamentalist audience with his explanation that he was not the Catholic Church’s nominee for president, but simply a Catholic running for president, another millionaire from Massachusetts will stand here to confront public misconceptions of his faith that could stand between him and his party’s nomination and ultimately the White House.
“It can be a defining moment for him - in that he can clear the deck of this particular question, if he speaks of his support for the Constitution and the separation of church and state,’’ says the Rev. C. Welton Gaddy, leader of The Interfaith Alliance and a pastor at Northminster Baptist Church in Monroe, La.
“Gov. Romney has tried to have it both ways on this issue,’’ Gaddy says of the former Bay State governor. “He has complained when people have raised the issue of Mormonism, and says religion should not be a factor, and then he goes (before an audience of Christian conservatives) and tells people they should support him because he’s a Christian.’’
Most Americans who regularly attend religious services – 60 percent – say presidential candidates should not use their faith as a means of influencing voters, according to a poll conducted for the Interfaith Alliance Foundation. And 68 percent of all surveyed by the firm of Greenberg Quinlan Rosner say the same thing. Plus, by a three-to-one margin, voters say clergy and religious leaders should not influence voters’ decisions.
“The vast majority of religious groups are accepted because they are seen as part of the mainstream,’’ says John Green, director of the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion and professor of political science at the University of Akron. “Poll after poll has shown that a great majority of Americans do want people of faith in office… For many evangelicals, however, the disagreements they have with Mormons are just a step too far.’’
Nearly four in ten Republican voters call themselves evangelical Christians, Pew’s polling has fund, and one quarter of all Republican voters voice reluctance to vote for a Mormon.
Yet Romney plans no attempt at explaining the tenets of his church with his speech at the George H.W. Bush Presidential Library on the campus of Texas A&M University here – he will leave it to voters to learn about Mormonism for themselves.
With a 20-minute speech also streamed live at the campaign’s Web-site, a spokesman says, Romney plans to address “the role that faith plays in public life, religious liberty and the tradition of religious tolerance in the progress of our nation. ‘’ And he will speak of how his faith “helped inform his values.’’
Romney also has tried to downplay the Kennedy-esque nature of this event – suggesting that JFK delivered “the “definitive speech’’ about the line between religion and politics in public life. Instead, he plans to discuss the role of faith in America and the role that his would play in informing his presidency.
“I'm not running for pastor-in-chief. I'm running for commander-in-chief," Romney told a Rotary Club audience this week in New Hampshire. “I'm certainly not a spokesman for my faith and don’t anticipate ever doing that.’’
Still, comparisons with Kennedy’s legendary appearance before the Greater Houston Ministerial Association on Sept. 12, 1960, are inescapable. “While the so-called religious issue is necessarily and properly the chief topic here tonight,’’ the 1960 Democratic nominee for president said then, “I want to emphasize from the outset that we have far more critical issues to face…
“But because I am a Catholic, and no Catholic has ever been elected president, the real issues in this campaign have been obscured,’’ Kennedy said. “I am not the Catholic candidate for president. I am the Democratic Party's candidate for president who happens also to be a Catholic.’’
Romney is a well-organized, passionate and promising Republican candidate who happens also to be a Mormon.
Among voters in general, accepting this involves confronting misconceptions surrounding a church that once espoused, but has eschewed, polygamy for over a century – though some Americans still equate Mormons with multiple marriages. But among fundamentalist Christians in particular, this involves confronting mistrust, and in many cases disdain, for a church that introduced its own prophets and added its own Book of Mormon to the Old and New Testaments of the Bible – a church some consider a cult.
“It’s really very simple,’’ Rodney Stark, professor of social sciences at Baylor University in Waco and author of The Rise of Mormonism says of the divide. “There has been an additional revelation, as far as the Mormons are concerned, but it just hasn’t happened, as far as the evangelicals are concerned.’’
If deftly crafted and written, some say, Romney’s address could advance his own cause as well as public understanding of his church with the widely-watched stage that he will take here.
“This is going to do a hell of a lot in the long run for attitudes about Mormons,’’ Stark suggests. People “are going to notice that he doesn’t have horns, and he doesn’t have extra wives.’’
Romney has chosen an august setting, at the library and museum of the 41st president. While former President Bush plans to introduce Romney, his campaign insists this is no endorsement. Bush also introduced Romney when he delivered an address on national security at the library earlier this year.
And Romney has chosen a critical time in his campaign. Until recently, the millions which he invested in early campaigning – including nearly $20 million of the venture capitalist’s own money reported so far – and personal time spent in Iowa and New Hampshire had yielded impressive results for his campaign.
But in recent weeks, Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas, has surged in polling both in Iowa and nationally. And Huckabee is a Baptist minister.
Huckabee now stands even with Romney among likely caucus-goers, according to the newest Iowa Poll of the Des Moines Register. He has made steady gains with his blend of folksy, good-humored campaigning and direct, pastor-like appeals to Christian conservatives that they must never abandon principle.
“Our party may be important, but our principles are even more important,’’ Huckabee told social conservatives at a “Values Voter Summit’’ in Washington. “Some things are not negotiable, the sanctity of life, the definition of marriage… Let us never sacrifice our principles for anybody’s politics - not now, not ever.’’
Huckabee’s message is as clear as can be: Rudy Giuliani, Republican front-runner in national polling, supports abortion rights, and Romney, who supported abortion rights as governor, is a late-comer to the anti-abortion cause.
Huckabee’s message has resounded among social conservatives, and his personality has charmed them and others. Asked in a recent Republican debate “what Jesus would do’’ about capital punishment, which Huckabee as a governor has executed, he replied: “Jesus was too smart to ever run for public office.’’
And suddenly, Romney faces big trouble.
“Romney’s whole campaign has been Iowa-centered,’’ says Dennis Goldford, professor of political science at Drake University in Des Moines. “And the center of that whole campaign has been Republican evangelicals… Huckabee rides in, and as it becomes clear that Giuliani and (Fred) Thompson and (John) McCain are not making strides here all of a sudden a big chunk of evangelicals, a plurality at least, seem to have found a place to go.’’
Romney may not be talking about the detail of his religion here in Texas, but people are talking about it in Iowa.
“This has been the elephant in the room that nobody wants to talk about,’’ Goldford says. “For good or ill, whether it’s theology or bigotry, there is a significant number of people who are not willing to vote for Romney, because he’s a Mormon.’’
The fact that, five decades after Kennedy overcame prejudices about his own religion to win election as president, a leading candidate must confront similar prejudices is a measure of the unrelenting role which religion plays in a nation with an avowed, constitutional separation of church and state.
“Kennedy was very successful in 1960, because in some senses he went into the Lion’s Den, and not only delivered what people think is a pretty good speech, but he also good a pretty good hearing,’’ Green says.
“One of the risks of (Romney’s) speech all along was that he would discuss the details about Mormon philosophy and it would confirm a lot of peoples’ suspicions about the theology,’’ Green says. “It does suggest to me that the campaign is very well aware of the risks of having this kind of speech.’’
• 
• 
• 
Comments
Faith informed him?
Informed him of what?
How a crackpot in the early 19th century dug up some plates in his backyard that were mysteriously engraved with gibberish?
Posted by: John Chuckman, Toronto, Canada | December 5, 2007 1:53 PM
When speaking of religion, why do the media not recall how the Clintons went to church on Easter Sunday, carrying their Bibles, and then going back to the White House so Bill could "entertain" his teeny-bopper intern. Religious hypocrisy is just hypocrisy under another name.
Posted by: Cary Oka | December 5, 2007 2:32 PM
My advice to Republicans--keep the faith but lose the fundies. The RRR and the neocons have hijacked the Republican Party. If you don't want to be the minority party for the next 20 years, recognize that the majority of Americans want issues such as education, wages, job security and health-care cost addressed. People are sick of the wedge issues, government doesn't have a place in deciding most of those anyway.
Now before any of the wing-nuts go off, Jerry White, that means you, this is just my sincere opinion.
Posted by: dt | December 5, 2007 2:40 PM
Please read below (word for word), because the Press should be embarrassed.
Maybe we should remove the part about the press.
Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Posted by: PG | December 5, 2007 2:52 PM
"ROMNEY RUNS FROM FAITH"
It's amazing how fast a Republican will run from his own religion when he gets his hands caught in the cookie jar. It was amazing to see how Romney went from a man who just hired people to perform a job, but when he found out that they were not human enough or American enough, he quickly turned and scorned them with his FAITH and RELIGIOUS CONVICTIONS TOWARDS ALL MEN.
Yep, forget that, deport, render do whatever, but don't associate them with me.
SAD SAD SAD. HE SHOULD OF STOOD BY THEM AND SIMPLY SAID HEY, IT IS A PROBLEM, BUT IT WASN'T A PROBLEM FOR THE LAST 2O YEARS WHILE AMERICA WAS BEING BUILT AND GROOMED BY THOSE SAME IMMIGRANTS.
HE SHOULD OF STOOD FOR MORE THAN WHAT HE FEELS HIS RELIGION IS, HE SHOULD OF STOOD FOR MANKIND AND HIS PLIGHT IN NORTH AMERICA.
AMERICA WOULD UNDERSTAND, AMERICANS WOULD HAVE TO UNDERSTAND. WE ARE NOT FOREIGN WE ARE AMERICA.
MAY MITT ISN'T AFTERALL.
MAYBE NONE OF THE CANDIDATES ARE AFTERALL!
Posted by: Roger Morris | December 5, 2007 3:28 PM
Thanks for the article. The more I read of Silva, the more I respect his work.
To John from Canada - this is our election, eh? Butt out.
Posted by: Jprice | December 5, 2007 3:52 PM
Sorry, mormonism is a secret society cult that practices strange rituals in their temples. Additionally, Romney wears weird underwear that he believes will keep evil away from him. They are very strange people.
Posted by: Donna Summer | December 5, 2007 4:05 PM
Why is it such a mystery to the public and especially to the media WHY Romney defers to the official spokesman for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when asked questions about his religion? Aside from the very real reason of separating Church from State as Romney and the Constitution have cited, which the media refuses to accept as a real reason...ask yourself first, why would any organization have an "official spokesman"? The answer is to guard against being totally misunderstood, taken out of context, and having our perspective twisted to fit the world's ignorant interpretations. It certainly shouldn't be hard to understand why we as a people, not just Mitt Romney, hesitate to speak in the public forum when history and first-hand experience has shown us how others love to persecute and give their own interpretation to our beliefs, instead of listening with an open mind and a contrite spirit. America ought to examine their motives when they seek to tear other people's religions down--especially when they refuse to go to the source to find the answer. In this case, the source is the Church organization itself, not one individual. Mormon.org is provided for the public to investigate further our beliefs. Stop badgering a presidential candidate because he respects his religious organization enough to allow them to answer questions about the religion. Go to those who have the authority and calling to speak about it, and stop persecuting people who may hold a different belief system just because it isn't your own.
Posted by: Linda Dieter | December 5, 2007 4:56 PM
PG...and your point is? No one held a gun to Mitt's head and said he had to explain his faith. He and his campaign advisers decided it was the prudent thing to do to. No one's telling him he can't practice his faith, either.
Personally, I couldn't care less what religion he subscribes to, or if he subscribes to any. I would be concerned, however, if he conducted the business of the United States as if he were a bishop presiding over his ward. Mormons, who number about 6 million members in the U.S., believe they are the only true church. Telling the other 294 million Americans that they need to convert wouldn't go over so well.
To the ethnocentric- challenged, that applies to America, as well. Believe me, nothing brings out the impression of the "Ugly American" more than telling the world you're the chosen ones before God.
And while we're on religion and it's place in matters of state, can we expand that to include sports? I have no problem with a player thanking the almighty for his/her inherited talents, but can we please refrain from implying that god really cares who wins or loses sporting events? Since Romney is Mormon, I'll pick on a Mormon school to illustrate my point.
Brigham Young University, after losing five straight games to it's rival, Utah, escaped with a win on the last play of the game last year, and it was coined a "miracle". O.K., I'm not gonna get bent over that, it could be taken figuratively, people say it all the time. But this is when it goes too far.
The scene; rivalry Saturday in "Happy Valley". No, not Penn State Happy Valley, Orem-Provo, Utah, home of Brigham Young University. The hated Utah Utes had just scored to go ahead 10-9 with just over a minute to play. After a fumble, a near interception and a sack, BYU faced a 4th and 18 with the game on the line.
The Utes pulled a "Bears" and blew coverage in the cover-two, allowing BYU receiver, Austin Collie, to convert a fifty yard pass. BYU went on to record another "miracle." So what does Austin Collie say when asked to comment on his heroics after the game?
“When you're doing what's right on and off the field, I think the Lord steps in and plays a part; magic happens.”
Well, you can imagine how well that went over to Utah players and their fans, many whom belong to the same faith. Imagine if a Bear player, after eking out a win against Denver, implied that the Lord was picking sides because of the way he lived his life? Do these people realise how ludicrous this sounds?
Alright, the sports analogies are a bit silly, but what can happen when fundies enter the room in a political debate, isn't. A true tale from Utah County (Happy Valley-WEST)
CALEB WARNOCK - Daily Herald
Utah County Republicans ended their convention on Saturday by debating Satan's influence on illegal immigrants.
The group was unable to take official action because not enough members stuck around long enough to vote, despite the pleadings of party officials. The convention was held at Canyon View Junior High School.
Don Larsen, chairman of legislative District 65 for the Utah County Republican Party, had submitted a resolution warning that Satan's minions want to eliminate national borders and do away with sovereignty.
In a speech at the convention, Larsen told those gathered that illegal immigrants "hate American people" and "are determined to destroy this country, and there is nothing they won't do."
Illegal aliens are in control of the media, and working in tandem with Democrats, are trying to "destroy Christian America" and replace it with "a godless new world order -- and that is not extremism, that is fact," Larsen said.
At the end of his speech, Larsen began to cry, saying illegal immigrants were trying to bring about the destruction of the U.S. "by self invasion."
All I'm sayin', keep religion out of politics.
Posted by: nauvoo or bust | December 5, 2007 6:11 PM
Linda Dieter,
Your point is well taken, but why do conservatives in general and Mormons in particular feel they need to make the media out to be the boogeyman? Do Mormons still feel they are being persecuted?
Since Bush has made a practice of hiring Regent University grads over people with superior education and experience, we're kind of curious as to whether Romney, if elected, would make the White House BYU East? Now I'm not picking on Mitt (or Kosmo), after all, the U of U has the stain on Karl Rove (however brief)to contend with. I just want to know if Mitt would be like Lincoln and his "Team of Rivals", or Bush and his army of Philistines, or whatever he calls his minions.
Posted by: nauvoo or bust | December 5, 2007 6:39 PM
If you believe in God or religion of any kind you are making some big leaps of faith. Christianity and Judaism alike accept some pretty amazing miracles just because they are written in religious texts by people who have been dead for thousands of years. Islam and eastern religions also have some pretty fantastical beliefs that require faith to accept.
So jumping on Mormons for believing in some miracles that you don’t believe in is pretty hypocritical. If you believe in God or miracles in any way you have no room to criticize Mormons. To imply that Mormons are somehow weird just indicates you don’t know many Mormons very well as they are about as normal as anyone else. If you have a problem with their undergarments which they wear to remember covenants with God then you should also give a Jewish person trouble about their yamaka which has a similar purpose, “symbolizes the humbling relationship between man and God”. If you believe in the Bible and just can’t handle the idea of the Book of Mormon then try opening you mind just a little bit as you read about the history of how the Bible arrived in your hands…some pretty big leaps of faith to accept it as infallible.
People are free to disagree with the Mormons, but not trusting them because of their religious beliefs just reflects your own ignorance of how difficult your belief system is to defend if a scientific approach were used. Let people believe as they feel is right and focus on their actions to determine if their faith is demonstrated in a constructive way. Someone said, “Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.” Anyone who knows Mormons knows they are generally pretty good, industrious, charitable people.
If you have no belief in God or religion then you are at odds with the vast majority of us anyway so just support or vote for whoever reflects your political agenda and throw religion out of it since you think we’re all a little crazy anyway.
Posted by: Trent Read | December 5, 2007 7:28 PM
How very amusing! PROOF that Smith had a revelation... Kind of like all that PROOF we have that some other religion is the one with the answers? This is a non-issue. What people SHOULD be worried about it that Mr. Flopper changes his view on important issues whenever it's politically expedient. Now don't get me wrong, I like a person that will admit they were wrong and try to change, but this Rommney's many flip-flops only show he's someone who will say anything or do anything to get what he wants. He already sold out Massachusetts, right? Campaigned on one thing, then did another (probably based on campaign contributions and poll results). That's what will happen to YOU the day after election day, when he's gotten what he wanted from you.
Posted by: Louis Nardozi | December 5, 2007 7:42 PM
nauvoo or bust, I would just like to thank God for granting me the ability to read 59 lines of whatever you wrote and agree with one line. hehehe
All I'm sayin', keep religion out of politics. :-)
My view (very short):
Romney didn't come out on stage before any of this started and say, "this is what my faith is". Because I'm with you, I don't care.
Can you sit there and truthfully tell me the denomination (written up by any journalist) of the entire Presidential runners, and we may as well add Congress.
They get asked questions and they respond, sometimes-kinda.
And as much as the illegals, football-praying, Satan.......... as you were expressing.....
I don't care. Does he have the stuff to run the Country, I believe he does. Is he going to be denied because of his Religion (1st Amendment), because if people take that approach then you may as well remove the entire 1st and it's freedoms.
Me, I'd be called a non-practicing Catholic. I haven't stole, killed coveted lately and those other things, so in my view I'm doing OK. Now, I'm not saying everyone I meet likes me...........
But I wouldn't be introduced to you, or if I met you and say," Hi my name is Peter, and I'm a non-practicing Roman Catholic gentile".
Football and being blessed: What about NE. QB Brady 4th down, didn't make it, timeout by the opposition before the snap, then Brady makes it, they score and win.
Talk about Patriots. Are they just lucky, was it the hand of God, or whatever you believe, good or bad coaching, the planets weren't aligned (kasinich) or all of the above.
But we do agree, the First Amendment rules. Freedom.
This was fun.
Posted by: PG | December 5, 2007 8:31 PM
The RRR and the neocons have hijacked the Republican Party. If you don't want to be the minority party for the next 20 years, recognize that the majority of Americans want issues such as education, wages, job security and health-care cost addressed. People are sick of the wedge issues, government doesn't have a place in deciding most of those anyway.
Posted by: dt | December 5, 2007 2:40 PM
Amen dt!!!
Posted by: Logic Prisoner | December 5, 2007 9:14 PM
PG,
Glad I could amuse you, sorry it was so long of a rant. A question for you, you being a Catholic (sort of). If BYU plays Notre Dame, which side is God on? And if BYU wins does that mean they are the true Church or vise versa? If BYU wins this year and loses the next, does it mean God has no preference, or that she's still a BYU fan but was too busy to intervene? These are questions that keep me awake at night, I'm sorry.
P.S.- God is definitely not a Bears fan. She's not a Patriot fan either, Belichick sold his soul to the devil.
Posted by: the anti-bruce | December 6, 2007 12:02 AM
jprice,
What a pathetically nasty comment you've made. It's just the kind of thing that gives Americans a bad name world wide: big nasty kids with money.
Besides, if you'd exercise your prejudiced mental capacity for two minutes before posting, you might realize that it could be my election, too.
More important still, since America chooses to go around the globe flexing its military and economic muscle against others, in a real sense, an American election is something everyone has in an interest in.
Your comment resembles the tone of American patriotic thugs who bellow about "Love it or leave it!" Just pure ignorance. Grow up.
Posted by: John Chuckman, Toronto, Canada | December 6, 2007 8:25 AM
What baffles me is if this discussion would be about any other religion you would be labled a "hater, a racist, a hate monger, and a bigot. But watching what is said about the mormon church seems to be not only okay but encouraged. I've known many LDS people. Let me tell you, if you've got a problem and need help, they're who you want on your side. Example.. Had a LDS friend who had a death in the family, I've never seen an outpouring from people of a faith before. Showed me that they walk the walk.
There are things about ALL religions that I just don't get. Things I could argue about to my death. But I don't and won't because it's "their faith" the same way I have "my faith". Gee, maybe that's why it's called a "faith". Definition : A belief that is not based on proof.
I also have a ton of Catholic friends. I was disgusted, outraged and just itching to ask "why the hell do you go to a church that swept pedofile priests under the rug so they could rape and molest more children???" or "how can you honestly go to church and not throw up a little in your mouth that your "church" turned a blind eye to the children they are in charge of? But you know what?? I don't ask my friends that because I respect their right to believe what they want no matter what my personal thought may be. Do you hear these questions about the Catholic candidates?? Nope. Let's just bash the Mormons.
While following all this nonsence my mind has traveled back to old History lessons in college. You know, the ones about why people originally came to this country to begin with. One big factor?? Freedom of religion. Yet here we are hundreds of years later it's pc to bash someone who's beliefs are different than yours.
I have watched this country go in directions I don't like. But I think you have to look beyond what you see on the "news" which i say loosely. News isn't news it's opinion. There's things I like and don't like about both parties. But there's no question that most people on the news programs are very very far left. So anything I hear I have to filter or do my own research. The left media is why we're even having this discussion. It's a story because they want it to be a story. Romney is a strong candidate. He's smart as hell, has an actual moral which Mrs. Hillary doesn't. And he's smart enough to know that as a small business owner, if my taxes are raised any more I'll be an ex-small business owner.
Lets judge on issues not someones personal life. If we want to bring peoples pers. life into play I could have a field day with Hillary.
Posted by: gurban | December 6, 2007 11:06 AM
the anti-bruce: you have many names.
Respectfully, (the expression) Stuck on stupid. :-)
Football analogies, you need to get out.:)
You asked which side God would be on, BYU v ND.
With their records I don't think either side. Probably playing a joke on both.
You went through the whole BYU/ND thing, then tell me God is not a Bears or Patriots fan. So your asking and answering.
Thank you for making my point. Freedom's, of speech, expression, religion, press....
Isn't it great we can talk about such things without being controlled by the State. (Exception for the forum moderator. He/she/they have control to allow our posts.)
Seriously, the Constitution (framers) was not an original document of thought. They took parts from other documents then formed it with their own thoughts and created a wonderful document. And the best part, guess which one I like.........
Yep, the First Amendment.
I really hope this helps you get some sleep, sounds like your being deprived. hehe
Posted by: PG | December 6, 2007 12:02 PM
Anti-Bruce,
God does not bet on one side or the other. God gave us free will to compete. God does not pin one over the other, people chose one over the other. To compete one over the other. If one side wins or the other it is the work of man. The reflection of man. Not a direct refection of the work of God. (Given that you believe in God to begin with) "Thanking God" or referring to "miracles" is an indirect reflection more on God giving us the free will to do as we chose to do in order to persevere. God did not favor the winning any more than the other team as they had the freedom to choose make the choices that led them to winning or losing.
Posted by: titan | December 6, 2007 12:19 PM
titan,
But what about Moses? Didn't he get a little help? And David of the Israelites, the "chosen ones", was he just blowin' smoke in this account:
1 Samuel 16:46-47 This day the LORD will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you down and cut off your head. And I will give the dead bodies of the host of the Philistines this day to the birds of the air and to the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel, and that all this assembly may know that the LORD saves not with sword and spear. For the battle is the LORD's, and he will give you into our hand."
BTW, BYU's coach, Bronco Mendenhall, likes to invoke Biblical tales to inspire his players. "Poor little BYU in the Valley of Elah vs. mighty USC and the Philistines", that sort of thing.
Man, I hate it when people quote scripture on here. Never again will I go that route.
PG,
Thanks for playin'. The Nauvoo thing is an inside joke with brucie. Bruce, aka former leftist, jfk democrat, sedona, dazed and confused, etc., etc. is the king of sock puppetry. He does it to have us believe there's all these voices claiming foul over perceived media bias. And, he talks to his other characters, hilarious. I seldom resort to it, and when I do, it's for fun, not deception.
Now about those records. BYU finished the season 10-2, ND 3-9. Against common opponents ND beat UCLA 20-6, BYU lost 27-17 but BYU beat Air Force 31-6, while ND lost AF 41-24. What does this prove...nothing (yes I answered my own question).
But I think titan has it pretty well figured out (God's hand) In a nutshell, Bears receivers have the free will to drop passes, and they exercise it with regularity. Bears defenders have the free will to miss tackles, and they've embraced it. Rex...well lets not go there.
Peace PG, I'm sure I'll sleep better now.
Posted by: Anti-Bruce | December 6, 2007 3:11 PM