Good Government More Important Than Religious Affiliation

One of the nation's leading evangelicals has been asked how his fellow believers might react to the candidacy of Morman Mitt Romney. He doesn't seem to bothered by it at all:

The Rev. Ted Haggard, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, said Friday he would have no problem voting for a Mormon for U.S. president.

"We rejected an Evangelical [Harriet Meiers] for the Supreme Court and accepted a Catholic [Samuel Alito]," said Haggard, who was in Salt Lake City to address the Religion Newswriters Association's annual convention. "It's a question of competence." Evangelical Christians are more interested "in good government," than in religious affiliation, the founder and senior pastor of New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colo., said. As the leader of the influential National Association of Evangelicals, which has 45,000 churches across the United States, Haggard's statement is significant because of the ongoing tensions over theology between The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and evangelical Christians. To many, Mormons are viewed as non-Christians because of their extra-biblical scriptures, rejection of historic creeds, claims to divine authority and unique rituals.

Some political observers have already suggested that a candidate such as Mitt Romney, governor of Massachusetts and a Mormon, would have trouble wooing Evangelicals.

I agree with Haggard. Give me leadership and competence, and I'll worry about religious leanings later. We're not electing the national pastor, but the Commander-in-Chief. Some evangelicals seem unable to recognize the difference, but I'm not one of them.