Tomorrow night Mitt Romney will deliver the much-anticipated, some might say threatened, Mormon speech. In a sincere desire to help, I have put together some ideas of my own. Mitt, buddy, use as much or as little as you want.

Ladies and gentlemen, my fellow Americans, my fellow Christians.

That's right, I said my fellow Christians.

Now, some of you may have a problem with that. Especially those of you who are Jews. Or Buddhists, Muslims, atheists or so on. But this speech isn't really for you people, because frankly, you won't be attending the Iowa caucuses, so shag off. This speech is for my fellow Christians. Of Iowan descent.

My fellow Christians, in this season when we celebrate the arrival on earth from an alien planet of Jesus, the son of Elihu, (and Lucifer's brother,) it's appropriate that we reflect on the spirit of religious tolerance that both mainstream Christians and Mormons have been forced by secularists to accept.

We all worship the same God. You may call him Jehovah, and believe he began as the storm god favored by a pack of middle-eastern camel traders. We call him Elihu, and believe he flew here from the planet Kolob. See? No difference.

You revere the virgin Mary. We revere the virgin-until-Elihu-nailed-her Mary.

You believe in life after death in a heaven that exists in an undisclosed location. We also believe that we will live on after death, ruling over one of the many available planets in the universe.

Both maintream Christian and Mormon must rely on faith, and faith alone to fully grasp the nature of this wondrous afterlife. The Christian has faith that, deprived of ambition, sex drive or meaningful employment, he will enjoy an eternity of singing "Hosanna!" and chilling with the ladies of the altar guild. Some might think that would get old after a few days, but because you have faith, you understand that even after a thousand years, a million years, a billion years, it will still be sweet, sweet joy. Hosanna!

Mormons, for their part, must have faith that eternal life forever joined with their earthly families, is paradise, as opposed to a vision of hell. They must trust that the wife whose charms began to wane several years ago will nevertheless satisfy their needs forever. For ever. And ever. And of course they have to assume that whoever currently inhabits those endless available planets will welcome the domination of toothy, white bread Utahans.

The point is that whether we wear magic underwear or not; whether we believe that Jesus hopped a flight to North America or stayed in the middle east; whether we believe that God arranged to show us the path to salvation by burying golden plates in a hole in New York, there to be discovered by a known fabulist, or believe that a loving God had no choice but to arrange the hideous execution of his son; whether we believe we are destined to become gods ourselves, or merely god's eternal cheering section; we can come together in this certain knowledge: we may all be crazy as hell, but we're still not as crazy as Scientologists.

Ladies and gentlemen, all religion is crazy. Granted we seem to have a little more crazy than is strictly necessary. But this, after all, the United States of America, not Lebanon. And despite the relentless exploitation of religion by the Republican party, I'm running for president and not pope or pastor or prophet. I'm a Republican candidate, not a Mormon candidate. So maybe, just a thought here, people, maybe we should shut up about our "Faith." Then we could talk about things like war and health care and education. You know, things that have to do with the whole President of the United States gig.

And thank whatever God you like that at least we're in no danger of ever electing an atheist.

This entry was posted by Michael Reynolds, on Wednesday, December 05, 2007. You can leave your response.