Mitt Romney is scheduled to give a major address about Faith and Values this Thursday. What with all the "Kennedy in Houston" spin and parallels being bandied about it might be helpful to take stock of what we have learned about his campaign thus far. Media representations of Mitt Romney’s religiosity have oscillated between two opposing themes. The first might be called Romney the Mormon. No shortage of journalistic angles here. Will anti-LDS prejudices surface as White Evangelicals (among others) consider a candidate who enthusiastically shares their agenda? How closely does the former governor of Massachusetts live by the precepts of his religion? And what exactly are the precepts of his religion, anyhow?
Mindful that ignorance and longstanding biases might lead reporters to explore exceedingly unflattering answers to these questions, the campaign shrewdly and preemptively countered with a different storyline: Romney the Man of Faith.
With Dwight D. Eisenhower serving as his medal-bearing, green-uniformed patron saint, Romney loves to riff on Ike’s famous dictum: “Our form of government has no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith, and I don’t care what it is.”
Team Romney has deployed this strategy with impressive efficiency. The former governor of Massachusetts relentlessly presents himself as just another Christian 'fella. When queried by journalists about odd aspects of the Mormon faith--aspects which I as an atheist want to stress are no more, or no less, odd than what can be found in just about any other religion--Romney typically responded with either vague platitudes or silence. (An example of the latter occurred when he refused to engage a reporter who asked him about specialized Mormon undergarments).
But the centerpiece of a plan designed to win over the Evangelical mainstream consists of making generous rhetorical use of Scripture. In my forthcoming book about the abuse (and occasional use) of the Bible in American politics, I observe that few current candidates thump the sacred writ as consistently as Romney.
On this score, he merits comparison with that unrivaled master of the politicized biblical citation, George W. Bush. Both know how to give Conservative Christian audiences the Good (Book) Stuff. Both know how to weave an Old or New Testament verse into their rhetoric. But in accord with his strategy of backgrounding his LDS affiliation, Romney also knows how not to weave Mormon scriptures into his oratory. Those waiting for him to invoke The Pearl of Great Price in South Carolina are sure to be disappointed.
All of this religious imaging has served to overshadow a third and, I think, more interesting face of this candidate. This would be Romney the Jaw-Droppingly Successful CEO. To glimpse this side of Romney one might consult his autobiographical Turnaround: Crisis, Leadership, and the Olympic Games.
In this text, which chronicles his stewardship over the once-tarnished Salt Lake City Olympiad, Romney the Mormon and Romney the Man of Faith are but minor characters. Instead, its central protagonist (a Harvard MBA and formerly the founder and CEO of Bain Capital Partners) appears as a bottom-line-obsessed rationalist, enamored of “strategic audits,” budget austerity, and the art of negotiation.
If you like managerial human interest stories then this is the book for you! When reading Romney's account of his executive world view (for what seems like thousands of pages) one encounters a narrative voice so down-to-earth, so clinically business-like and, dare I say, so secular, that one wonders if Mayor Michael Bloomberg was his ghostwriter.
If Romney can ride the The Man of Faith strategy to his party's nomination, he will need to engage in two difficult maneuvers. First, he must weld together a Republican base that has been torn asunder over the past year. Next, he will need to let his secular countenance shine forth. This will be his only chance of appealing to voters, be they believers or nonbelievers, who loathe the type of Faith and Values politicking that he has engaged in up to now.
Jacques Berlinerblau is the Rabbi Harold White Chair in Jewish Civilization in Georgetown's Walsh School of Foreign Service and senior advisor to the Center for Jewish Civilization, where he was director from 2006 to June 2020. Berlinerblau has published on a wide variety of issues ranging from the sociology of heresy and modern Jewish intellectuals to African-American and Jewish-American relations.
