There are many things wrong with the presumptive Republican candidacy of Mitt Romney. Mitt is wishy-washy, a mediocre politician at best, willing to say or be for anything that will get him ahead. But that's just me as a liberal. If I was a Republican Party elder, I'd be fearful of a Romney campaign for an entire other reason. It's a terribly hard sell to convince the evangelical right (a huge percentage of Republican voters) to consider a Mormon elder like Romney a true Christian.
Rick Warren, head of Saddleback Church, which claims 20,000 weekly church goers, and co-author of the ridiculously popular book "The Purpose Driven Life" (with sales of more than 30 million units), is very influential among the evangelical community. What he told Jake Tapper has to make every Republican operative working for a 2012 victory very, very nervous.
“I have a congregation that’s very large. It talks to me all the time. Most people would not think they’re better off economically than they were four years ago,” Pastor Warren said. “I hold everybody responsible for that. I hold the people who got themselves into debt. I hold the government that got themselves into debt. I hold multiple administrations. It’s not the fault of any one person.”
With Republican Mitt Romney moving closer to becoming the first Mormon presidential nominee, I asked Warren whether he believes Mormons are Christians — a contested issue among evangelicals.
“The key sticking point for evangelicals and actually for many is the issue of the Trinity… that’s the historic doctrine of the church that God is three-in-one,” Warren said. “Not three Gods; one God in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Mormonism denies that.”
Ouch.
I don't see how Romney gets over that hurdle. The only hope I guess he has is to revive the whole Obama-is-a-Muslim trope to point to the only religious faction more horrifying to the evangelical voter.
