Bottom Line: Delivered with passion, the Speech was an important and traditionally conservative take on the role of religion in public life. Philosophers and theologians might quibble about details, but the important thing to note is that the Speech was so good (by modern standards) that it is worth hearing to quibble with it!
Romney demonstrates he is intellectually ready to be President of the United States. He is not just smart (in the MBA sense), he is thoughtful.
Supporting Analysis:
General Comments on the Romney Speech
Aren’t you ready for a thoughtful President?
Aren’t you ready for someone who can change his mind on issues when presented with data and arguments?
Aren’t you ready for someone who will not change his mind on core values, because it would be politically expedient to do so?
As I have said repeatedly on this blog, the charge that Romney is a “flip-flopper” is nonsense, because Romney would be the nominee if he “flip-flopped” on religion.
I came to prefer Romney to my second choice candidate (Huckabee), because I think him better prepared intellectually to be President. I like Mike and think he was an effective governor of a small state, but Mitt Romney was forced to confront the intellectual culture of Massachusetts.
Mitt Romney had to wrestle with the intersection of our (mostly) secular intellectual elite and the governance of a (mostly) religious nation.
Critics of his speech on religion in public life that wish he had mentioned (as George W. Bush often does) the non-religious have missed this important point. The number of non-religious in our culture is so small, it is hard to poll. However, they are dominant in certain elite areas where sociological pressure (which also exists FOR religion in other areas) makes a thoughtless agnosticism the norm.
Romney is a thoughtful man of faith who has been forced to confront both the thoughtlessness of the faith of the majority with the unreasoned faithlessness of an elite minority.
He did so, as we can now see, in a reasonable way that preserved his passion for religious knowledge..
This is simply an opportunity that Mike Huckabee, from very Christian Arkansas, has never had.
Thank you, Mr. President, for your kind introduction.
It is an honor to be here today. This is an inspiring place because of you and the First Lady and because of the film exhibited across the way in the Presidential library. For those who have not seen it, it shows the President as a young pilot, shot down during the Second World War, being rescued from his life-raft by the crew of an American submarine. It is a moving reminder that when America has faced challenge and peril, Americans rise to the occasion, willing to risk their very lives to defend freedom and preserve our nation. We are in your debt. Thank you, Mr. President.
Mr. President, your generation rose to the occasion, first to defeat Fascism and then to vanquish the Soviet Union. You left us, your children, a free and strong America. It is why we call yours the greatest generation. It is now my generation’s turn. How we respond to today’s challenges will define our generation. And it will determine what kind of America we will leave our children, and theirs.
America faces a new generation of challenges. Radical violent Islam seeks to destroy us. An emerging China endeavors to surpass our economic leadership. And we are troubled at home by government overspending, overuse of foreign oil, and the breakdown of the family.
Over the last year, we have embarked on a national debate on how best to preserve American leadership. Today, I wish to address a topic which I believe is fundamental to America’s greatness: our religious liberty. I will also offer perspectives on how my own faith would inform my Presidency, if I were elected.
There are some who may feel that religion is not a matter to be seriously considered in the context of the weighty threats that face us. If so, they are at odds with the nation’s founders, for they, when our nation faced its greatest peril, sought the blessings of the Creator. And further, they discovered the essential connection between the survival of a free land and the protection of religious freedom. In John Adams’ words: ‘We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion… Our constitution was made for a moral and religious people.’
Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom. Freedom opens the windows of the soul so that man can discover his most profound beliefs and commune with God. Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone.
Romney places his speech on religion in the context of a generational transition. The children that were taught in public schools of the 1930’s and 1940’s about America’s religious heritage are passing from us. Due to Supreme Court rulings, the next generations have not had their blessings.
Romney begins the process of teaching us what the World War II generation had stamped on their political DNA: the message of the Declaration of Independence.
Slowly, over the centuries, Christians worked out the relationship between the knowledge one gains from spiritual things and the knowledge one gains from the world. This Christian intellectual tradition culminated in the American experiment to allow people of all faith to operate in a polity that maximizes individual freedom of conscience.
Christians can allow Faith to inform their decisions in politics, but must maximize the chance for citizens of different faith to allow their religious beliefs to inform their decisions.
Romney is appealing to an American tradition that celebrates a broad civil religion designed by Christians to allow citizens of all Western faith traditions an umbrella of protection where they can practice their faith (ethically) while still serving in government.
This civil religion is always under attack by religious and secular extremists, but they never have anything better with which to replace it.
Usually what they have is much, much worse.
The last paragraph this section of Romney’s speech should be memorized by future school children. It is thoughtful, important, and articulate which is something very rare in a modern political speech.
Given our grand tradition of religious tolerance and liberty, some wonder whether there are any questions regarding an aspiring candidate’s religion that are appropriate. I believe there are. And I will answer them today.
Which rightly implies that there are questions that are NOT relevant.
Secularists that think religion is nonsense and so should have no say in what a man thinks will not follow this logical train.
Well and good.
Romney is staking out a position that will tolerate even that rejection of religion, but assumes the vibrancy of faith in American life.
That is a sound assumption.
Almost 50 years ago another candidate from Massachusetts explained that he was an American running for president, not a Catholic running for president. Like him, I am an American running for president. I do not define my candidacy by my religion. A person should not be elected because of his faith nor should he be rejected because of his faith.
This is the weakest part of the Speech. It relies on a fuzzy “tolerance” that assumes that every American religion will play by the rules of the civil religion and of logic when it enters politics.
This is not true, as the jihadists demonstrate.
I would not vote for a jihadist for President, because he or she is a jihadist.
Perhaps Romney is assuming that fringe religions will never get that close to power and so (again) is dealing with the mainstream and religious ninety percent of the American population.
Still this part of the speech is ineffective and points to a model of church-state in John F. Kennedy that Romney rejects. Kennedy had an almost totally privatized faith that did little too little to inform his behavior.
Romney is a man of religious conviction so deeply from the American mainstream of church-state relations that he may forget this at times.
Let me assure you that no authorities of my church, or of any other church for that matter, will ever exert influence on presidential decisions. Their authority is theirs, within the province of church affairs, and it ends where the affairs of the nation begin.
This is an important point that some Christians might misunderstand.
Romney is not privatizing his faith here, but showing the broad outlines of where personal faith and the civil religion intersect.
The civil religion allows men and women of strong particular faiths to serve without compromising their conscience. Of course, there are some faiths (a tradition that demands theocracy for example) for which the civil religion has no room.
Any faith tradition that demands obedience to the Church authorities in areas where the Constitution would demand disobedience will not be able to have members in good conscience serve. This is why civil government should be limited in scope to avoid as many as possible of the otherwise irresolvable conflicts of conscience that would exclude people from service.
In fact, Mike Huckabee should (attempt) to match this speech to show why his integration of faith and government does not go too far. Does it exclude too many people by expanding the states “care” of others so far that it would make too many decisions that would contradict too many other religious traditions?
Small government is the friend of a traditional American Christian because small government allows a tolerant state where crisis of conscience for the politician are blessedly rare.
Romney is in a church and in a state where he does not have to choose between his duty as a patriot and his duty as a Mormon. We can be sure, given the history of his religion being persecuted, that Romney will, in the end, favor a limited government and the traditional American civil religion.
Romney is not saying Caesar is Lord, because America has no Caesar.
If there must be a Caesar, then as a Christian I will need him to be a Christian. The American genius was to proclaim: “No King, but King Jesus” and so allow those who will not (yet!) bow the knee to King Jesus to be full citizens of civil government with small ambitions.
The fact Romney gets this is remarkable today, but would have been commonplace in past generations.
Do the other Republicans share his sophisticated understanding?
Do some go too far in privatizing faith, making it utterly irrelevant to the external world, or do they go too far the other way unintentionally sowing seeds of intolerance?
Romney’s brilliance forces them to say.
As governor, I tried to do the right as best I knew it, serving the law and answering to the Constitution. I did not confuse the particular teachings of my church with the obligations of the office and of the Constitution — and of course, I would not do so as President. I will put no doctrine of any church above the plain duties of the office and the sovereign authority of the law.
As a young man, Lincoln described what he called America’s ‘political religion’ — the commitment to defend the rule of law and the Constitution. When I place my hand on the Bible and take the oath of office, that oath becomes my highest promise to God. If I am fortunate to become your president, I will serve no one religion, no one group, no one cause, and no one interest. A President must serve only the common cause of the people of the United States.
There are some for whom these commitments are not enough. They would prefer it if I would simply distance myself from my religion, say that it is more a tradition than my personal conviction, or disavow one or another of its precepts. That I will not do. I believe in my Mormon faith and I endeavor to live by it. My faith is the faith of my fathers — I will be true to them and to my beliefs.
This central part of the speech fleshes out the traditional American relationship between the broad civil religion and the particular faith of the politician.
It demonstrates Mitt Romney gets it. Christians have nothing to fear from him.
More fearful to our liberty and to the faith (long term) would be a pious man who went too far in strengthening the civil religion (excluding those of different faith from government service) or a secular man who went too far weakening it (excluding those of any faith from service).
Some believe that such a confession of my faith will sink my candidacy. If they are right, so be it. But I think they underestimate the American people. Americans do not respect believers of convenience.
Right.
Let’s be blunt: Mike Huckabee has the most brilliant political commercial of the race, his fun Chuck Norris ad.
Mitt Romney now has the best substantive speech in the race.
That is why (at the moment) I prefer Romney.
Americans tire of those who would jettison their beliefs, even to gain the world.
There is one fundamental question about which I often am asked. What do I believe about Jesus Christ? I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the Savior of mankind. My church’s beliefs about Christ may not all be the same as those of other faiths. Each religion has its own unique doctrines and history. These are not bases for criticism but rather a test of our tolerance. Religious tolerance would be a shallow principle indeed if it were reserved only for faiths with which we agree.
There are some who would have a presidential candidate describe and explain his church’s distinctive doctrines. To do so would enable the very religious test the founders prohibited in the Constitution. No candidate should become the spokesman for his faith. For if he becomes President he will need the prayers of the people of all faiths.
Romney did not say, “Mormonism is just like your faith!”
As I have argued before, the only “religious tests” Romney needs to pass are those he does pass.
Romney gets it, because he has had to get it as the member of a minority religious community.
It is time for traditional American Christians to back the traditional American Christian position of fair play to those who play fair in the realm of religion and politics.
I believe that every faith I have encountered draws its adherents closer to God. And in every faith I have come to know, there are features I wish were in my own: I love the profound ceremony of the Catholic Mass, the approachability of God in the prayers of the Evangelicals, the tenderness of spirit among the Pentecostals, the confident independence of the Lutherans, the ancient traditions of the Jews, unchanged through the ages, and the commitment to frequent prayer of the Muslims. As I travel across the country and see our towns and cities, I am always moved by the many houses of worship with their steeples, all pointing to heaven, reminding us of the source of life’s blessings.
I have had this experience as well.
Romney is not saying that all faiths are equal or equally true.
He is saying the better thing that all the faiths he has encountered have at least a valuable fragment of the Truth.
This is the reasonable ecumenicism of the American conservative tradition.
We fiercely hold to our particular visions, but recognize the value of other perspectives.
Evangelicals and traditional Christians can hear this championed in a longer way in C.S. Lewis’ Abolition of Man. It is not a compromise of my fierce belief that Christianity is true to say that another religion may have (in practice) understood the truth better than my own.
I can learn from those with whom I have disagreements. That is the way of Lewis, of Augustine, and of the Christ. It is intellectual charity mixed with a good dose of practical humility.
It is important to recognize that while differences in theology exist between the churches in America, we share a common creed of moral convictions. And where the affairs of our nation are concerned, it’s usually a sound rule to focus on the latter — on the great moral principles that urge us all on a common course. Whether it was the cause of abolition, or civil rights, or the right to life itself, no movement of conscience can succeed in America that cannot speak to the convictions of religious people.
This is exactly on of the sound “religious tests” I have proposed. Before voting it is good to ask, does this man or woman share my basic moral convictions.
Romney does and he is as unalterable on this as a fallible human can be.
We separate church and state affairs in this country, and for good reason. No religion should dictate to the state nor should the state interfere with the free practice of religion. But in recent years, the notion of the separation of church and state has been taken by some well beyond its original meaning. They seek to remove from the public domain any acknowledgment of God. Religion is seen as merely a private affair with no place in public life. It is as if they are intent on establishing a new religion in America — the religion of secularism. They are wrong.
The founders proscribed the establishment of a state religion, but they did not countenance the elimination of religion from the public square. We are a nation “Under God” and in God, we do indeed trust.
We should acknowledge the Creator as did the Founders — in ceremony and word. He 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. Our greatness would not long endure without judges who respect the foundation of faith upon which our constitution rests. I will take care to separate the affairs of government from any religion, but I will not separate us from “the God who gave us liberty.”
Read this to your children.
This is a clear expression of the beliefs that have always motivated the best of the American experiment. Theocrats will not like it. Secularist fundamentalists will hate it, but it has spared us religious wars and Stalin.
God bless it and God bless any candidate who gets it.
Nor would I separate us from our religious heritage. Perhaps the most important question to ask a person of faith who seeks a political office, is this: does he share these American values: the equality of human kind, the obligation to serve one another, and a steadfast commitment to liberty?
They are not unique to any one denomination. They belong to the great moral inheritance we hold in common. They are the firm ground on which Americans of different faiths meet and stand as a nation, united.
We believe that every single human being is a child of God — we are all part of the human family. The conviction of the inherent and inalienable worth of every life is still the most revolutionary political proposition ever advanced. John Adams put it that we are ‘thrown into the world all equal and alike.’
The consequence of our common humanity is our responsibility to one another, to our fellow Americans foremost, but also to every child of God. It is an obligation which is fulfilled by Americans every day, here and across the globe, without regard to creed or race or nationality.
Americans acknowledge that liberty is a gift of God, not an indulgence of government. No people in the history of the world have sacrificed as much for liberty. The lives of hundreds of thousands of America’s sons and daughters were laid down during the last century to preserve freedom, for us and for freedom loving people throughout the world. America took nothing from that Century’s terrible wars — no land from Germany or Japan or Korea; no treasure; no oath of fealty. America’s resolve in the defense of liberty has been tested time and again. It has not been found wanting, nor must it ever be. America must never falter in holding high the banner of freedom.
This is right.
I argued for it beginning here.
In fact, I got so excited about this part of the speech that in my vanity I imagined that perhaps the Governor had read our little blog.
Then I had the obvious and humbling realization that the Governor is echoing great minds eloquently and my few posts are just the inchoate defense of those very same ideas.
Mitt Romney is so steeped in the Great American Tradition of civil discourse that he echoes Lincoln and Madison.
We should all aspire to do the same.
These American values, this great moral heritage, is shared and lived in my religion as it is in yours. I was taught in my home to honor God and love my neighbor. I saw my father march with Martin Luther King. I saw my parents provide compassionate care to others, in personal ways to people nearby, and in just as consequential ways in leading national volunteer movements. I am moved by the Lord’s words: ‘For I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: naked, and ye clothed me…’
My faith is grounded on these truths. You can witness them in Ann and my marriage and in our family. We are a long way from perfect and we have surely stumbled along the way, but our aspirations, our values, are the self-same as those from the other faiths that stand upon this common foundation. And these convictions will indeed inform my presidency.
How many Republican candidates can say the same?
Today’s generations of Americans have always known religious liberty. Perhaps we forget the long and arduous path our nation’s forbearers took to achieve it. They came here from England to seek freedom of religion. But upon finding it for themselves, they at first denied it to others. Because of their diverse beliefs, Ann Hutchinson was exiled from Massachusetts Bay, a banished Roger Williams founded Rhode Island, and two centuries later, Brigham Young set out for the West. Americans were unable to accommodate their commitment to their own faith with an appreciation for the convictions of others to different faiths. In this, they were very much like those of the European nations they had left.
It was in Philadelphia that our founding fathers defined a revolutionary vision of liberty, grounded on self evident truths about the equality of all, and the inalienable rights with which each is endowed by his Creator.
We cherish these sacred rights, and secure them in our Constitutional order. Foremost do we protect religious liberty, not as a matter of policy but as a matter of right. There will be no established church, and we are guaranteed the free exercise of our religion.
I’m not sure that we fully appreciate the profound implications of our tradition of religious liberty. I have visited many of the magnificent cathedrals in Europe. They are so inspired … so grand … so empty. Raised up over generations, long ago, so many of the cathedrals now stand as the postcard backdrop to societies just too busy or too ‘enlightened’ to venture inside and kneel in prayer. The establishment of state religions in Europe did no favor to Europe’s churches. And though you will find many people of strong faith there, the churches themselves seem to be withering away.
Infinitely worse is the other extreme, the creed of conversion by conquest: violent Jihad, murder as martyrdom… killing Christians, Jews, and Muslims with equal indifference. These radical Islamists do their preaching not by reason or example, but in the coercion of minds and the shedding of blood. We face no greater danger today than theocratic tyranny, and the boundless suffering these states and groups could inflict if given the chance.
The diversity of our cultural expression, and the vibrancy of our religious dialogue, has kept America in the forefront of civilized nations even as others regard religious freedom as something to be destroyed.
In such a world, we can be deeply thankful that we live in a land where reason and religion are friends and allies in the cause of liberty, joined against the evils and dangers of the day. And you can be certain of this: Any believer in religious freedom, any person who has knelt in prayer to the Almighty, has a friend and ally in me. And so it is for hundreds of millions of our countrymen: we do not insist on a single strain of religion — rather, we welcome our nation’s symphony of faith.
Recall the early days of the First Continental Congress in Philadelphia, during the fall of 1774. With Boston occupied by British troops, there were rumors of imminent hostilities and fears of an impending war. In this time of peril, someone suggested that they pray. But there were objections. “They were too divided in religious sentiments,” what with Episcopalians and Quakers, Anabaptists and Congregationalists, Presbyterians and Catholics.
Then Sam Adams rose, and said he would hear a prayer from anyone of piety and good character, as long as they were a patriot.
And so together they prayed, and together they fought, and together, by the grace of God … they founded this great nation.
In that spirit, let us give thanks to the divine “‘author of liberty.” And together, let us pray that this land may always be blessed, ‘with freedom’s holy light.’
God bless the United States of America.
Pick it apart any way you want, but this was a thoughtful explication of the American experiment by a politician. We used to expect that from our leaders.
Romney makes his best point of the speech in this section. He compares the dry and dying secularism of Europe to the overly fervent irrationality of the jihadists. He warns America against either.
Right again.
Romney has set a very, very high bar for the rest of the field. Now let’s see them match it.