Romney Aims to Prove His Christianity

"We don't understand why anybody would turn around and say the Mormon Church is not Christian when the very center, the very core of everything we teach, everything we believe, is centered in the life and ministry of the Lord Jesus," said Elder M. Russell Ballard, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, the leading governing body of the church.

Since it was founded in Palmyra in 1830, the Mormon Church has, at least in numbers, cut a wide swath across the American religious landscape. Mormonism has become the fourth-largest religion in the United States, with 6 million adherents in the country and 7 million abroad.

But many outside Mormonism are unfamiliar with it. More than half of Americans surveyed in the Pew poll said they knew little or nothing about the faith. Asked to give a one-word impression of Mormonism, 75 percent said "polygamy," a practice that Mormons repudiated more than 100 years ago, and 57 percent called it a cult.

Romney's speech is being compared to the 1960 speech given by John F. Kennedy to dispel concerns among Protestant voters about his Catholic faith.

But those voters were familiar with Kennedy's faith. "Mormonism is a very complicated theology," said Jan Shipps, a Mormon scholar. "When John Kennedy was running for president, [non-Catholics] were scared of the Catholics, but at least they knew what Catholicism was."

Because of their doctrine and practices, Mormons have spent much of their history battling discrimination and persecution.

Shortly after the Book of Mormon was printed in 1830, Smith and his band of followers were forced to flee Palmyra, which had become hostile to them. They were then hounded out of communities in Missouri and Illinois, where Smith was killed by a mob in 1844.

After Smith died, most Mormons went to Utah. They founded Salt Lake City, where the faith is now based.

Smith taught that the true church of Jesus Christ disappeared with the death of Christ's last apostle and that Christianity lapsed into darkness -- the "great apostasy," Mormons call it -- for almost 18 centuries. He also said that God used him to restore the "only true church" to the Earth.

Mormons have dropped some of the faith's more notorious teachings. In addition to believing that polygamy was sanctioned by God, they believed until 1978 that God did not allow black people to serve in their priesthood. They have rejected both doctrines, but they still allow only men to serve as priests.

In Palmyra, tens of thousands of visitors -- Mormons and non-Mormons -- annually stream through the exhibit hall and visit the surrounding historic sites, including the cabin in which Mormons believe the angel first visited Smith, the grove of trees where he said he saw visions of God and Jesus Christ, and the shop where the Book of Mormon was printed.

To the small but thriving Mormon community that has returned, the questions facing Romney are puzzling.

"I think we're the epitome of Christianity, to be honest," said Chris Cottrell, 36, a Mormon convert who was baptized three months ago and lives near Palmyra. "Because we believe in modern-day prophecy doesn't make us any less Christian."