Mitt Romney Mormon

<span style="font-size: small; font-family: Arial;”>Mitt Romney is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, often known as a Mormon. Mormon is a nickname, however, not the actual name of the Church. The church is a lay church. This means that the extensive programs of the church are carried out by volunteers. Members of the Church become accustomed to finding themselves in positions for which they had no real prior training or experience, and simply jumping in. They consult more knowledgeable people, study, practice, and most importantly, they pray. In time, they become skilled at the task they’ve been assigned. Mormons learn to do whatever needs doing.

<span style="font-size: small; font-family: Arial;”>This has been the background of Mitt Romney’s life. He learned throughout the years to do whatever needed doing. In 1968, when he was a young man, he accepted a call to go to France for two and a half years to teach the people there about the church. Missionaries are sent away from their homes and families and expected to learn to thrive in and understand the new culture they’re placed into.

France was a troubled place, and an unnerving experience for a young American man. There were riots, disrupted communication, and a government near collapse. Romney, who had already faced the hardship of trying to teach religion in a country filled with chaos, was just preparing for a new challenge as assistant to his mission president. Already he was consistently a leader in the accomplishment statistics of the mssion. He worked hard and got results. He was ready for leadership.

Unfortunately, as he drove the mission president, the man’s wife and Romney’s missionary companion to an appointment, another car came speeding around a curve, missed a turn and swerved into Romney’s lane, hitting his car. Romney was pronounced by police to be dead. He wasn’t, but for a time, no one was sure he’d survive. The mission president’s wife did die. Romney’s grief was intense.

However, despite grief and the physical pains of the accident, Romney was not allowed much time to recover. His mission president left for a time to take his wife’s body home. Romney, only 21 years old, and his companion, found themselves in charge of an entire mission, a task normally assigned only to much older men. They were to oversee two hundred missionaries and assist in serving 3000 church members. Another mission president, assigned to Geneva, was sent in to provide emergency training and support, but he quickly found the young men knew what to do, and so he returned to his own mission. He said they were quite capable. Romney pushed aside his grief and pain and focused on the task in front of him. He was excited by the opportunity to learn to do something extremely difficult under difficult circumstances.

The expectation was that they would do the minimum required to keep things functioning, a tremendous task in itself. However, Romney was not then, as he is not now, content with doing the minimum. He decided that although they’d only baptized 70 people the first half of the year, they’d baptize a total of 200 for the entire year. He went around the mission, speaking to the young missionaries and getting them excited about this new goal. He learned to speak to large audiences, a skill which has benefitted him greatly in his secular life.

Mitt Romney’s mission introduced him to a life of unselfish service, of putting the needs of others before your own, even in the midst of great trials. This is one of the blessings that can come from a well-served mission.

Sources:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/09/AR2007120901473.html?hpid=artslot&sid=ST2007120901595

http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/10/18/romney.missionary/index.html

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/11/14/america/romney.php

It’s no secret that Ann has long been idolized by Mitt. It’s been said that Mitt, while serving as a Mormon missionary, cringed at the imagined possibility that Ann might have other marital prospects in his two year service for the Lord and lengthy absence from his high-school sweetheart.  As soon as they could envelop themselves in personal conversation after his return from France, Mitt told Ann that between his leave and his homecoming–feelings hadn’t changed.  He asked her to marry him and Ann said yes.

Tagg, Mitt and Ann’s oldest son, often speaks of the “rule in the family”: His father was consistent in affirming and adhering to his policy that no one would talk back to or otherwise be disrespectful towards Ann, their mother.  Mitt reveres and respects his wife, Ann, and has always thought he was privileged to be at her side.

Ann, strikingly attractive, is as down to earth as her husband.  It was at her prodding, that Mitt reconsidered the opportunity to turnaround the Olympics.  It is her job, as he’s told her on more than one day when she was frazzled after mothering, that he saw as more important than his.

Ann has an extensive background of service, within the walls of her home as she and Mitt raised her five sons, and within the community.  Ann has served in the New England Chapter of the Multiple Sclerosis Society,  volunteered with a Boston academy focused on helping inner city youth, and helped to develop the “Right to Play–a non-profit organization that uses sports to help disadvantaged children” (1). She is a convert to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

One Boston Herald article records, “Ann Romney is the sun around which the Romney solar system–Mitt and five sons: Tagg, Matt, Josh, Craig and Ben–revolves” (2).

See Mitt Romney: The Man, His Values, and His Vision, Mapletree Publishing Company, Denver Colorodo, 2007, pp 81-82).

“He was extraordinary . . . my dad . . . I am a small shadow of the real deal.” As Turner and Field note in Mitt Romney: The Man, His Values, and His Vision: “Any father’s heart would swell to hear his son–especially his son the successful businessman, governor, and presidential candidate–describe him in such humble yet powerful terms” (Mapleton Publishing, 2007, p.1)

Mitt Romney was born March 12, 1947 in Detroit, Michigan and is the son of former Governor of Michigan and Presidential candidate George W. Romney. He and Ann have been married 36 years and have five sons (Tagg, Matt, Josh, Ben and Craig) and nine grandchildren.

Two hearty generations are linked together in Willard Mitt Romney:

Like his son, George Romney was a CEO, governor, and presidential candidate. The physical resemblance is striking: chiseled features, winning smile, and a full head of graying hair. But there are differences at every step along father and son’s journey, beginning with starkly different childhoods.

George Wilcken Romney was born on July 8, 1907, in Colonia Juarez in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. The Romneys, along with thousands of other Mormons, immigrated to Mexico in the 1880s. . . . the family prospered in Mexico, where George Romney’s father, Gaskell, was a successful building contractor. Then Pancho Villa swept across northern Mexico during the revolution at the start of the twentieth century.

Gaskill Romney and his family fled back to the United States in 1912. He became just another carpenter trying to feed his family. The Romneys spent the next decade on the move, from Texas, to Los Angeles, to Idaho before settling in Salt Lake City in 1921. (Ibid)

George served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) in Great Britain, where he managed to address crowds in London at Hyde Park and Tower Hill. Following his mission, he spent some time in Washington, D.C. attending Washington University. After reconnecting with his high-school sweetheart, he married, settled in the area, and served as a lobbyist for Alcoa. He then began his tenure at American Motors, where the Romney talent to turnaround businesses manifested itself and where Mitt Romney, learned from his father, a great lesson: “Nothing is as dangerous as entrenched success.” (3)

See Mitt Romney, The Man, His Values and His Mission, Mapletree Publishing Company, Denver, CO, 2007.