My Favorite Mormon*

I think Mitt Romney is good for America.

First, he is damned handsome. After almost eight-years of smirk and sneer, I want a President and Vice President you can look into a camera and lie to me with a smile that is comforting rather than dismissive. Second, he dresses well; really well. I don’t know if he shops at Men’s Warehouse, but I guarantee he likes the way he looks. Third, he believes in a lot of weird things; weird even by US standards where Jesus is more apt to appear in a cheese sandwich for sale on e-Bay then in church.

Of course Mitt has a right to believe what he wants, and I am not challenging that right. I applaud it. I am happy not only that he believes what he believes but also that the rest of us are slowly learning more about what he believes. And the reason I like this is because it gives us the chance to realize how weird all our beliefs are.

Mitt believes that a fifteen year old New York boy, Joseph Smith Jr., was visited by God the Father and his Boy Elroy (no, I am not denigrating Christianity with what appears to be a reference to the Jettsons cartoon show which, by the way, was scientifically vapid and, with the exception of the micro-mini skirt, failed to make even one accurate prediction about the future (I want my flying car, damn it!), I am simply being incredibly erudite and assuming you know that “Elroy” means God the King, a title that is very fitting God’s Son, Jesus, who was crowned King of the Jews). Why is this a weird belief when millions and millions of people, Christians and Moslems alike, believe that a similarly aged Jewish girl named Miriam (which means Bitter Water, and for some reason was a popular girl’s name back then) had a similar visitation in ancient Palestine?

Mitt also believes that two years latter, Joseph Smith was visited by the angel Moroni who told him the whereabouts of a hidden gospel inscribed on golden plates and authored by the prophet Mormon (Peace be upon him). Why is this weird when millions and millions of people believe that Mohammed was visited by the angel Gabriel and, over time, given a new revelation called the Qur’an? And let us not forget the half-dozen or so Jews who still believe God spoke to Moses out of a shrub? Isn’t that weird as well?

My point is that all religious beliefs are weird to people who do not hold them. I suspect that Mike Huckabee believes that the world was created in seven days less than ten thousand years ago thus denying everything we know about biology, physics, astronomy, geology, etc., and insuring that a Huckabee administration will guarantee America will soon become the most scientifically illiterate nation in the world. Isn’t that weird?

Mitt is good for America not despite the fact that he believes in the weird, but because he believes in it. We are the land of the free and home of the brave, and what is more brave than to believe in the weird? While I won’t vote for Mitt for president, I hope his Mormon faith is true and that someday he will be a god of his own planet. I guarantee the people on that planet will like the way they look.

*For those too young to get the allusion, and realize just how clever I am, google "My Favorite Martian."