Pastor Romney

I studiously avoided the Presidential debate last night. I am not very interested in listening to two guys lie to me. Plus we were at the pregnancy resource center ministering which is a far more valuable;e use of my time. Anyway we got home and my wife turned on the TV and since all we get is broadcast TV of course the very end of the debate was on. I was in the other room but I could hear them. Romney said something that made my ears perk up. This is from the CNN transcript of the second debate (Emphasis added)

My - my passion probably flows from the fact that I believe in God. And I believe we're all children of the same God. I believe we have a responsibility to care for one another. I - I served as a missionary for my church. I served as a pastor in my congregation for about 10 years. I've sat across the table from people who were out of work and worked with them to try and find new work or to help them through tough times.

If I call myself Pastor maybe they will forget I am a mormon?

THAT got my attention. Mitt Romney, in case you missed it, is a mormon. He served in the Stake Presidency in Massachusetts and also as a "bishop" in his ward. This is important to note. As a mormon I never once heard a single reference to any mormon leader as "pastor". In fact pastor was more often a pejorative term. I would never have called the bishop of any ward we were in "pastor" nor would we have called the stake president by that title.

So why would Mitt Romney call himself a "pastor" when he never would have referred to himself as a "pastor" when he was in leadership and none of the people he led would have called him that either? Maybe saying "I served as a bishop and stake president" sounds too weird and alien to evangelical voters ears? Perhaps using those terms would remind evangelical voters that he is part of a religion that historically called orthodox Christianity heretical and an abomination in God's eyes?

Make no mistake. Mitt Romney is quite literally trying to become a wolf among the sheep and his job is made easier because the sheep have no idea what wolves look like. So many Christians think that Mitt Romney "shares our values" because he claims to be pro-life (at least when it comes to abortion). As a Christian, I can think of very few values that I would think Mitt Romney has in common with me because my values are formed by my faith in Christ, a faith that Mitt Romney does not share and in fact actively rejects. He talks about God but the "god" he worships is one of many in a polytheistic pantheon and is not the God we read of in the Bible. He says that we are all "children of the same God" but he means that literally in the sense of being offspring from a procreative act.

I am not saying you can't or shouldn't vote for Mitt Romney. I will not be but not because he is a mormon. I think and President Obama are two peas in the pod and neither of them would know the truth if it was tattooed on their foreheads. What I am saying is that because of the perverse marriage between politics and what we understand as the church many Christians are getting the impression that we share more in common with Mitt Romney, a pagan blasphemer, because he is "conservative" than we do with a "liberal" follower of Christ.

If you vote, and you are under no religious obligation to do so no matter what some blowhards say, do so based on your conscience and with your eyes wide open. Mitt Romney is not "one of us" and he does not share "our values" and neither does President Obama. Just watch how Romney speaks and pay attention to the words he uses because it is clear to me that he is trying to deceive the elect by making himself out to be something he is not.