Inasmuch as it is uncertain whether Mitt Romney will address the influence of his religion on his actions were he elected President, I present the following as my imagined possible speech that might explain something of his Mormon beliefs and their relation to his political candidacy.

Fellow Americans:

Today I would like to address a topic that has been discussed ever since I announced my candidacy for President:  My religion, Mormonism, or, officially, my membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

As you know, I have been a Mormon all of my life.  I served a mission for the Church in France.  I graduated from Brigham Young University.  I have served in various positions in the Mormon Church, which as you know has a lay ministry.  My parents were Mormons, as were their parents.  One of my forbearers was Parley P. Pratt, one of the original Apostles of the Church selected by Joseph Smith.  My grandparents practiced polygamy, and fled to Mexico to escape prosecution for that practice, which at the time was an integral part of the religion, but which was officially suspended in 1890, with the objective of achieving statehood for Utah, with the full benefits of liberty under the U.S. Constitution. for the inhabitants of the Utah Territory  (It is of some note that a contemporary of my father's in Colonia Juarez, the Mormon colony in Mexico, was Henry Eyring, one of the foremost physical chemists of the 20th Century, who studied at Berkeley, as well as under Ferrington Danials at Wisconsin, and Polyani in Berlin at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute between the Wars, and taught at Princeton where he was a colleague of Albert Einstein, and became the first Dean of the Graduate School of the University of Utah, whose book, Faith of a Scientist, I recommend, and will today try to present the Faith of a Politician, although I will fall short of the achievements of Henry Eyring).  As Jan Shipman says, I am a DNA Mormon, born and bred in the religion of my fathers.  Yet I have not followed that religion based solely on tradition or reverence for my parents and forbearers, but because of my own faith and conscience, and I have been well-served by the principles my religion has taught and continues to teach me.  I hope to never lose faith in that religion.  I am grateful to my parents and their parents before them for their religious faith, and for the fact that they imparted to me and shared with me their faith.  I have tried to do the same for my children.  I know my life could not have been what it has been without the religious foundation imparted to me by my parents, my family, and my many Mormon co-religionists who have taught and supported me.

The question before me, that the nation considers critical, is what the effect of my religion would be on my actions as President if I were elected.  This is the question that John F. Kennedy addressed in his campaign for the White House.  He assured the nation that the Pope would not be the de facto President.  Of course, this is true in my circumstance as well:  The President of the Mormon Church would not exercise religious authority over my actions as President.  The reasons in my case, however, are perhaps somewhat different than those of President Kennedy, as I will attempt to explain.

As you may know, the Mormon Church is the fourth largest religious organization in the United States today, after the Catholic Church, the Southern Baptist Convention, and the United Methodist Church.  Thus it is a significant part of the religious landscape of America.  It has, from shortly after the time of the American founding, been a part of the National  experience, from the religious revivals of Upstate New York in the early 1800's, to the banking crises in the 1830's,  to slavery as reflected in the Mormon experience in Missouri (in part the Mormons were driven out of Missouri under an extermination order issued by the Governor because of their opposition to slavery in a border state at a contentious time in American history),  to westward expansion with the great Mormon emigration to Utah, the Mexican American war to which Mormons contributed a battalion, the California gold rush (gold was discovered at Sutter's Mill by Mormons), the Civil War (many of the officers prominent in the Civil War accompanied Johnson's army to Utah in 1858, including General Johnson who died at Shiloh),  the construction of the transcontinental railroad completed at Promontory Point in Utah, the exploration and development of the West, (John Wesley Powell's observation of the pattern of Mormon settlements, farming, and irrigation formed the basis for his recommendations to Congress on the development of the West, which were ignored by Congress that instead pursued a policy of rapid development symbolized by the Oklahoma land rush that resulted in the dust bowl of the 1930's--two Mormons were waiting for Powell when he sailed out of the Grand Canyon and disembarked at the mouth of the Virgin River, now under the waters of Lake Mead) the world wars, the great depression (it was, unfortunately, a Mormon, Senator Smoot, who co-authored the Smoot-Hawley legislation that is blamed in part for creating the Great Depression), and the Cold War (the beloved Candy Bomber of Berlin, during the blockade and the Berlin Airlift, for example, was a Mormon).  Mormons have contributed to the nation in many ways, such as the invention of television (perhaps not such a boon you will say), methods of synthetic diamond making, muck-raking journalism (Jack Anderson), the hospitality industry (JW Marriott), Professional sports (Steve Young and others), pop music (the Osmonds), journalism (Brit Hume), commentary and talk radio (Glenn Beck) and political advising and campaigning (Bay Buchanan), service in different presidential administrations (Ezra Taft Benson under Eisenhower, Brent Scowcroft under George HW Bush and previous presidents) and politics (Harry Reid, et.al.), and have been the subject of popular movies and the lore of the West(Butch Cassidy).  Indeed, Mormons originally settled Las Vegas, long before Bugsy Segal showed up, and a Mormon wrote the gambling regulations for the State of Nevada!  Mormons settled the intermountain West from Calgary to Mexico, from San Bernardino and Carson City to the Western Rockies.  In many different ways, Mormons have been a part of the fabric of the nation.  My own father participated extensively as you know, in national life, as the Chairman of American Motors, the Governor of Michigan, and a presidential candidate until his comments on the Vietnam war way-laid his campaign.

The Mormon Church originated in the great religious awakening of early 19th Century America, which can perhaps best be understood as the response of the recently empowered citizenry to the guarantee of religious freedom established by the Constitution.  Ordinary Americans, empowered by the freedoms of the Bill of Rights, vigorously and zealously exercised those religious rights, as well as all the others, leading to a plethora of religious denominations, perspectives, and practices, Mormonism among them, as well as to an almost unlimited number of civic organizations to address perceived ills in the citizenry. Transcendentalism was likewise an outgrowth of the new American ethos, of the American Endowment of individuals with divine rights.  America became and remains the most religious while most religiously diverse nation on earth, due to its guarantee of freedom of religion. Tocqueville observed that religious fervor in the 19th Century, and opined that it was a major source of America's strength, indeed, that if that religious fervor that he saw, which also manifest itself in great acts of charity and altruistic communitarian behavior that were rampant in the nation then and still characteristic of America today, were to be lost, America would suffer; indeed, he said, if America ceased to be good, it would cease to be great.  At the time he wrote, America was not a major power, and there was something prophetic about that statement, as America was yet to become great in the eyes of the world.  He wrote in the time of Jackson, who had also observed that the American form of government would prove so effective that America would rise to become the greatest nation in the history of the world, and so it has come to pass.  But it was not so when Tocqueville wrote, yet he wrote as if it were.  This perhaps had to do with his admiration for and confidence in the American Founding, of which he was a very astute observer.  Religious freedom and pluralism have been and continue to be the soul of the nation, and, I believe, do indeed have much to do with its greatness, its uniqueness, its exceptional nature.  Octavio Paz in the 20th Century, in his great book "The Labyrinth of Solitude" commented on the same American penchant for "reform" and activist enthusiasm, complaining however that American participitory democracy always seemed directed toward process and not to the roots of self-governance;  he interpreted this as a deficiency, but it rather underscores the fundamental agreement of the populace with the founding documents and form of government.

My religion has instructed me on that American Founding.  The Church recognizes that its existence, its origin, was dependent on the religious freedom granted in the American Founding, that without that freedom, Mormonism would not have been come into being.  Great reverence is afforded by Mormons to the American Founding and America's Founding documents.  I was taught as a youth that the hand of Divine Providence guided the American Founding, indeed, that the Founding was effected by men whom God raised up for the very purpose.  My religion also teaches me that America is a land blessed above all other lands, in large part due to the Founding and the consequent freedoms that we enjoy.  Today there is a great deal of criticism of the Founders, and their faults, foibles and hypocrisies are emphazied.  For me, this mostly serves to emphasize Divine intervention, as it is less plausible that such scoundrels, intriguers, and hypocrites as they are popularly depicted now could have effected such a profound revolution in human governance without the assistance of a higher power.  (Perhaps the most singular image of the American Founding and the Revolutionary War for me is the painting by Arnold Freiburg of Washington praying in Valley Forge).  Indeed, the American Founding documents are regarded almost as a religious canon in Mormonism.  In this light, it would be indeed incumbent upon me as President to defend and uphold the Constitution as a virtually sacred document.  Nat Henthoff, the jazz impresario, columnist, former ACLU board member and avid and profound and dedicated Constitutionalist, who describes himself as a "flaming atheist Jew", states that his only religion is the American Constitution.  For me, the American Constitution is an integral part of my religion.  Any attempt by religious authority to advise something that would go against the Constitution would be suspect, a violation of my Faith, and I would regard it as such.  For me, placing my hand on the Bible and swearing to uphold, protect, and defend the U.S. Constitution as President would be a transcendent moment, a profound and a humbling experience, indeed, and a sacred obligation.  That Constitution represents the highest achievement of Mankind in the realm of governance.  It did not, of course, form a perfect Union, but there is no more perfect Union, nor has there ever been. As Harry Jaffa writes, the American Founding created the Best Regime.   And to preserve the blessings of liberty established by that Constitution is the foremost thing that can be done for ourselves and our posterity.  And I would seek all the help of Providence that I could obtain in performing that task. as President.

The reverence that my religion teaches for the American Founding has a number of implications. 

First, it requires the acknowledgement of Natural Right.  This is the great concept of Western Civilization that is the basis for the American Founding, as stated in the Declaration, that all are endowed by their Creator with Unalienable rights, by Nature and Nature's God, including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  The concept of Natural Right was broached by Socrates, elaborated by his pupil Plato in The Republic and Crito, accepted by Aristotle, and incorporated by the Scholastics, in Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologica, his summation of Catholic doctrine.  It was extensively examined in the Enlightenment, by Locke, Hobbes, Rousseau, Voltaire, Hume, Smith, essentially all of the Enlightenment thinkers.  Leo Strauss provided a remarkable evaluation of the history and thought on this concept in his treatise, "Natural Right and History."  In the 19th Century, Natural Right was questioned, and ultimately discarded by European thinkers, in favor of a materialist, supposed Newtonian mechanical view combined with Marxist economics, deterministic thermodynamics with the Second Law requiring the physical "Heat Death" with the maximization of Entropy,  and Darwinian evolution into a view of history that was completely deterministic but also accidental and denied the validity of Natural Right.  By the beginning of the 20th Century, the concept of Natural Right was out of favor, and a pessimistic, virtually nihilistic philosophy of the Will to Power, beyond good and evil, advanced by Neitzche, came into vogue, and eventually underwrote the rise of totalitarian ideologies such as Nazism, Fascism, and Communism.  Post-Modern secular philosophy has accepted the view of Man as a slightly evolved ape, whose cognitive capacities are suspect, and whose fate is beyond  conscious control, ruled by Freudian implulses beyond anyone's ken, whose existence is contingent and accidental, and of no meaning, a being hardly endowed by any higher power with anything akin to Natural Right.  Unfortunately, there is a strong trend among American political and intellectual elites to reject the concept of Natural Right. in favor of post-modern philosophical ideas that reject natural right and the principles of the American Founding, with, however, no coherent suggestions for anything to supplant the Founding for human governance.  Our modern age falls far short of the Enlightenment in the vigor and breadth of its ideas, and certainly, no superior form of governance has been broached. Current philosophies  reject the American Founding and the American Constitution, the highest achievement in governance in human history, and attempt to replace it with a rather incoherent and only partially enunciated and confused philosophy that has no alternative to governance other than totalitarianism.  Natural Right is a Platonic concept, empowering the individual in society with value and ability while asserting that there exists an ideal of justice and governance which can be perceived or conceived of by mere mortals, who are indeed endowed with sufficient cognitive capactiy to consider such sublime ideas.  Those ideas might not encompass entirely the ideal, but can approximate to a substantial degree that ideal.  This is the objective of the American Founding.

Jergen Habermas, the philosoopher of the public sphere and American Pragmatism, recently wrote:  "Christianity has functioned for the normative self-understanding of modernity as more than a mere precursor or catalyst.  Egalitarian universalism, from which sprang the ideas of freedom and social solidarity, of an autonomous conduct of life and emancipation, of the individual morality of conscience, human rights, and democracy, is the direct heir to the Judaic ethic of Justice and the Christian ethic of Love.  This legacy, substantially unchanged, has been the object of continual critical appropriation and re-interpretation.  To this day, there is no alternative to it.  And in the light of of the current challenge of post-national constellation, we continue to draw on the substance of this heritage.  Everything else is just idle post-modern talk."

Joseph Smith, the Mormon founder, regarding the autonomy of individual human beings, said:  "For the power is in them, wherein they are agents unto themselves, and in as much as men do good, they shall in no wise lose their reward."

The Abbe' Reynal, in the 18th Century, considering natural right, observed that human capacity for choice and action was extremely plastic, that Man's capacity for good and ill was almost unlimited. 

General Burgoyne, defeated at Saratoga in the Revolutionary War, wrote of the American "rabble in arms" that descended on him like hornets from a disturbed nest  and defeated him, as a new kind of being, one that seemed almost beyond his understanding, ordinary men who came out of the woods to join the battle, picking off his officers, felling trees in his path, watching his passage silently from hill-top ridges in home-spun clothing, un-observant of the rules of class and privilege to which Burgoyne was so sensitive, willing to risk all to fight for a cause, and effective and resilient in doing so, but those same apparent wild barbarians showed great deference and civility to the defeated British army.

Thomas Jefferson apotheosized the "American Yoeman," recognizing that the struggle for his own liberty rested on the strong shoulders and the good will and committment of ordinary Americans.

I submit that the language of Divine Endowment of Unalienable Rights in the Declaration, and the codification of those rights in the Constitution, indeed created a New Being, a new form of human, of greater dignity, power, ability, and responsibility, than had ever existed before in the World.  It unleashed a creature of greater capacity than had previously been conceived to exist.  That new individual is the American, an exceptional being indeed.  But a being who is most truly exceptional in that he considers himself unexceptional, believing that his rights, his autonomy and self governance, is the birthright of all humanity, and he is more than willing to share, to impart, to help others to achieve, that same status of freedom, even to give his life so that others may enjoy that freedom.  And it has always been so.  From the Battle of Bunker Hill, in which ordinary Americans withstood advance after advance of British soldiers, of the most powerful army on earth at the time, until they ran out of ammunition; to the Battle of New Orleans, in which a rag-tag militia greatly outnumbered, decimated the troops that had defeated Napolean;  to the Battle of San Jacinto, to the Omaha Beach, and WWII, in which the Citizen Soldier defeated the Nazi war machine;  to flight 93, to the battle of Fallujah and Samara, and all over Iraq and Afghanistan.  The American, as a soldier and citizen, is typified by the soldier in the first Gulf War that brought President George HW Bush to tears, caught on videotape saying to the surrenduring Iraqi soldier, oxymoronically for any other soldier in any other army, but characteristic of the American soldier: "We're American Soldiers.  We won't hurt you!"  In case you don't believe that the spirit of the Founding and of Freedom exists still in America, I would refer you to Christopher Hitchen's recent article in Vanity Fair describing his experience with the family of Mark Jennings Daily.  One can only marvel while standing in humble awe at the greatness of soul of America's best, as we grieve deeply the loss of such a remarkable individual.  Here, we must acknowledge, was an American.

My religion provides unqualified Divine approbation for these perspectives, for the great Traditions of Judaic Law and Christian Love, of the divine nature of the individual, as a child of God, endowed with religious liberty and a Divine light of conscience, which are essential to the valid practice of religion, as true religion can only be practiced in liberty, without coercion of any kind, as Robert Spencer continuously reminds us is a core concept of Christianity.  Men are to choose freely, otherwise there is no choice, and one cannot be an agent to oneself, or do good of one's own volition, in which case there can be no reward for right choice and obedience to God.  This is the perspective presented by Milton in his epic poem, the basis for the Conflict in Heaven, over coercion versus freedom, that resulted in the rejection of Lucifer's proposal of coercion.  From the fires of Sinai, to the scenes of the New Testament, the early Church Fathers, the writings of Augustine, the logical edifice of the Scholastics, to the Reformation, the Enlightenment, and ultimately the freedom of religion of the American Founding, my Mormon religion gives a resounding endorsement of the hand of Divine providence at work in the affairs and ideas and faith of Man, culminating in our Constitutional religious freedom.  Joseph Smith has said on the subject of choice and freedom in worship and the exercise of ecclesiastic authority:

    "Many are called, but few are chosen.  And why are they not chosen?  Because their hearts are set so much upon the things of this world, and aspire to the honors of men, that they do not learn this one lesson--That the rights of the priesthood are inseparably connected with the powers of heaven, and that the powers of heaven cannot be controlled...only upon the principles of righteousness.  That they may be conferred upon us, it is true; but when we undertake to cover our sins, or to gratify our pride, our vain ambition, or to exercise control or dominion or compulsion upon the souls of the children of men...., behold, the heavens withdraw themselves; the Spirit of the Lord is grieved; and when it is withdrawn, Amen to the priesthood or the authority of that man..... No power or influence can or ought to be maintained by virtue of the priesthood, only by persuasion, by long-suffering, by gentleness and meekness, and by love unfeigned; by kindness, and pure knowledge, which shall greatly enlarge the soul without hypocrisy, and without guile.  Let thy bowels..be full of charity towards all men...and let virtue garnish thy thoughts unceasingly; then shall thy confidence wax strong in the presence of God; and the doctrine of the priesthood shall distil upon they soul as the dews from heaven..."

Leaders of the Mormon Church are constrained by the very nature of their religious understanding from imposition of any sort of coercive ecclesiastic authority over political leaders or the polity. The Kingdom of Heaven is not of this world; the Kingdoms or Republics of this world are not the means of salvation.  Mormonism holds sacrosanct the freedom of religion, religious pluralism, and the separation of Church and State.  Mormonism absolutely affirms the unrestrained and uncoerced religious expression of every individual according to the dictates of one's own conscience and belief.

Harold Bloom has written of the unique character of American Religion, suggesting a strong individualism that he refers to as an American Gnosticism, and which he identifies in Mormonism as well as other American religious traditions, one could argue, in Transcendentalism, of the empowerment of the individual in a religious sense to access divine inspiration for one's own life and affairs, encouraging individual interpretation of religious doctrines as applied to one's own circumstances and life, a supposed departure from formal and formulaic doctrinal authority.  Indeed, Mormonism encourages individual study, searching, learning, and inspiration.  Like other American religious traditions, the individual is given reign to develop his or her own understanding and insight.  This is considered essential to the development of the individual, who is imbued with divine potential and is tasked with developing that potential.  Mormonism teaches that a Man cannot be saved in ignorance.  The Glory of God, we are instructed, is intelligence.  Man is considered, as a child of God, to have unlimited, indeed infinite and Divine potential.  It is true, that long before Huey Long was singing "Every Man a King" Joseph Smith was proclaiming every man an embryonic deity of divine potential.  This underscores the worth of the individual, that the worth of souls is indeed great in the sight of God.  A being of infinite potential is of potential infinite worth.  This is nothing more nor less than a complete affirmation of Natural Right, of the American individual, in accord with the pronouncements of the Declaration of Independence and the American Founding.

In a different vein. Michael Gelernter, the reknowned computer theorist, has written of an American Zionism, an American religious tradition of exceptionalism, with connotations of a gathering of nations, of building the City of God, the New Jerusalem, the City on a Hill to which Ronald Reagan often referred, a beacon and a light to the nations.  This concept of gathering, of Zion, implies a communitarian ethos, and Mormonism partakes deeply of this ethos.  Joseph Smith laid out a city in Missouri he designated to be the gathering place, Zion in America.  Mormons later built the city of Nauvoo, on the banks of the Mississippi in Illinois, which became the largest city in the nation outside of the East coast, larger at the time than the city of Chicago.  Visitors to the city commented on the orderly and pacific nature and the beauty of the city, and on enquiring of how Smith managed such a city, he stated that he merely taught correct principles and the citizens governed themselves.  Mormonism taught of a religious city in which all things were held in common, a completely voluntary order, to which man might aspire, and which was the order of God, called the United Order.  In Utah, where Mormons had fled after persecution in Illinois, they attempted to implement such a society, among a few devout and intrepid Mormons who founded the village of Orderville. Ultimately that experiment foundered, and the Mormons who attempted it acknowledged the failure was their own, that they were of insufficient character to voluntarily pursue the divine economic order, which can only be approached, they believed, through righteousness, and only voluntarily (to distinguish this order from the totalitarian nature of communism).  Mormons contented themselves with a fallback to the capitalist order of the American Republic, of private property and free markets, without relinquishing the dream of some day achieving sufficient righteousness to achieve the divine order.  Their model was the City of Enoch, described in the writings of Joseph Smith now included in the Pearl of Great Price, one of the canonical works of the Mormon Church.  Nevertheless, Mormons remained devoted to provision for each other, and have developed one of the more extensive and efficient welfare programs of any religious group.  This was of course an entirely religious and voluntary system, outside of the realm of any government program, and is in the great tradition of religious charitable efforts that have graced the history of America.  America is, and has always been, a world leader in private charity, and the generosity of ordinary Americans exceeds that of all other nations. I am certainly proud of this legacy of my religion and my nation.

This communitarian orientation stands alongside the strong individualism in Mormonism as in other American religious traditions.  It is further emphasized in Mormonism through focus on the family (and we admire the work and efforts of those engaged in support of the family, such as James Dobson, to whom I believe America owes a great debt of gratitude, and whose efforts I would unreservedly endorse, even though he may not endorse my candidacy) and the Mormon efforts in geneology.  A fundamental precept in Mormonism is the importance, the divine and eternal nature, of the family.  The family provides a sense of  identity while also providing a sense of continuity and connection with community.  Indeed, Mormonism universalizes these relationships and emphasizes the bonds of kinship of all nations, kindreds, tongues, and peoples, past, present, and future, and connects all to all in a great chain of being for the human family.

It may appear paradoxical, but it is not:  American political empowerment of the individual, along with, I submit, Mormon (as well as other American religious traditions') religious empowerment of the individual, strengthen the bonds of family and community and nation, and comprise the social compact describe by Locke and so eloquently re-stated in the Declaration of Independence.

Second, the American Founding, and my religion, require the acceptance of Reason.  The Founders relied upon the model of reason that was the bible of the Scientific Revolution and the Age of Reason, that unsurpassed treatise of deductive logic, Euclid's Geometry, as a model in expounding the Axioms of governance in the Declaration of Independence.  As with Euclid's Geometry, the Founders stated 5 Axioms of governance:  1)  All men are created equal (there is no divine right of kings, nor of aristocratic privilege when it comes to governance.  2) All are endowed with unalienable rights, e.g., divine rights are possessed by individuals, not by kings.  3)Governments are formed with the purpose of protecting unalienable rights of citizens(this is the social compact as enunciated by Locke).  4) Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed--the state exists for the benefit of the citizen, not the citizen for the benefit of the state.  5)Whenever any government egregiously abuses the citizens and fails to protect their rights, it is then the right of the citizens to throw off that government. 

America is an axiomatic nation.  That the Declaration promulgated axioms is supported by Franklin's correction in the Declaration, "We hold these truths to be self-evident," using  the term "self-evident" truths, to mean Axioms, replacing Jefferson's initial draft words "sacred and undeniable".  Lincoln in his Gettysburg address used the term "proposition" that all men are created equal, yet this is actually a postulate, an axiom, a statement accepted without proof, rather than a proveable proposition.  Indeed, any other postulate would lead inexhorably to the subjugation of some classes of individuals by other classes of individuals.  Martin Luther King used the term "creed" and many have called America a creedal nation.  Indeed, the phrases of the Declaration of Independence are awe-inspiring in their breadth and succinctness, to the point of seeming to be a creed; yet a more accurate characterization of America is as an axiomatic nation.  The Founders, particularly Franklin, were men of the Enlightenment, of Science, the Age of Reason, Deists with a mechanical world view after the Newtonian synthesis of the Laws of Motion and Gravity, who, however, had no wish to suppress religious expression (to the contrary).  They wished to appeal in the Declaration not only to their exercised consitutents, but to the world at large for the rationality and reasonableness of their cause.

After stating their axioms in the Declaration of Independence, the Founders ultimately proceeded to draft the U.S. Constitution to give substance to their axioms.  The Constitution was inspired by the Newtonian synthesis, and the mechanical world view.  As Deism perceived the cosmos to have been created as a mechanical structure for the benefit of mankind, to run in perpetuity for generations unlilmited of the human family, so the Founders viewed the Consitution as a mechanical construct of governance, with checks and balances, like the flywheels and gears of a fine watch, to run in perpetuity to assure the blessings of liberty to generations yet unborn.  It was a deductive construct, designed and built by reason, and has surpassed all previous and subsequent attempts to logically structure government for the benefit of the citizenry, to preserve individual liberty.  Critical to that structure is the concept of freedom of religion.  The Founders clearly saw the need for a devout and informed and engaged polity, a need they considered essential to the success of their mechanical construct of government.  The Founders clearly perceived that that structure could be undermined and destroyed if the axioms were discarded, or the polity ceased to care about the maintainance of the structure of government established under the Constitution.  Franklin responded to the query of a constituent about what government the Constitutional Convention had given her, "A Republic, madam, if you can keep it!"  Acceptance of the concept of Natural Right and the axioms of the Declaration are essential to preservation of the Constitution.  To discard the axioms results in the collapse of the Constitution.  To destroy the structure of the Constitution, which of course can be done under the Constitution itself, results in a rejection of the axioms of the Declaration.  Henry Clay spent most of his waking moments, as well as many of his sleeping moments, concerned with the preservation of the Constitution.  Jackson accepted it as sacrosanct. Lincoln risked all to preserve it.

Modern Science, built on reason, is said to be contrary to Faith.  Stephen Weinberg, one of the great modern physicists,  has said that the more the Universe is comprehensible, the more it is devoid of meaning.  Professor Dawkins and others ridicule religion as dangerous superstition.  Bertrand Russell, a devout atheist, escoriated religion.  Secular progressives seek to fully suppress religious expression.  Yet the Founders understood better.  Faith is essential to Reason.  The human capacity for reason is a manifestation of the Divine.  From the time when Pythagoras sat down and drew lines in the sand to convince himself that not just a triangle with sides in proportion to 3, 4, and 5 (as used by the Egyptians for a thousand years or more in their annual survey following Nile floods) are right triangles, but all triangles satisfying the relation [A]squared + [B]squared = [C]squared, in his proof of the theorem that bears his name, to the full production of Euclid's Geometry, to the creation of the Calculus and Newton's use of it to explain gravitation and the elliptical orbits of the planets, to Einstein's formulation of General Relativity based on Special Relativity and Rieman Geometry that predicted an expanding Universe, which he was loathe to accept when Le Maitre pointed out to him that implication of his Theory and which, however, proved to be true; and Dirac belatedly recognized the prediction of the existence of anti-matter in his relativistic equation of the electron after cloud chamber experiements presented him with the candidate for the understanding of his equation, Science and Reason have postulated a pattern, a Platonic ideal if you will, behind the workings of the observed world, that could be elucidated by human minds, often mathematically.  As Pythagoras was a mystic numerologist, and Newton a devout, indeed obsessive Christian,  Kepler also a mystic, and Einstein a believer in God (whom he said did not play dice with the Universe), so science has always been underwritten by faith.  To discard faith is to discard the confidence of design in Nature that can be understood by human cognition.  And to discard Reason is to diminish Faith.

Certainly, as Paul said, we see through a glass darkly.  From the Church-Turing halting hypothesis in computational theory, to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, and Godel's incompleteness theorems, we know that human reason is finite and fallible, yet remarkable, even breath-taking in its extent and capacity.  One might observe that there is nothing so remarkable in the Universe as a human embryo, which, within a few short years, can become an individual who explicates the nature of space and time, or the origin of species, or investigates radioactivity or explains the nature of the atom.  Man's reach will always exceed his grasp in Reason as well as in Faith, but as Browning queried, or what's a heaven for?  We will be ever learning, perhaps never coming to a full knowledge of Truth, but always coming ever closer to it, if we are rigorous and honest with ourselves.  We can be just as deceived by reliance on false science as we can be deceived by reliance on erroneous religious or ethical concepts.  The examined life is necessary with a Socratic rigor in Faith, Politics, and Science.

Perhaps the individual who most persuasively discourses on Faith and Reason currently is Pope Benedict. To the extent that I interpret his discourse, I find myself very much in agreement from my own religious perspective.

My political heritage as an American, as well as my religious heritage as a Mormon, teach me of the profound relationship of Reason and Faith. 

So to the point:  How would my religion influence my actions as President?

It  leads me to consider human life sacred, and to pursue policies consistent with that sanctity.
It  leads me to empower individuals, strengthen families, and encourage citizens to be deeply involved in their religion of choice and the life of their families and communities, as well as of their nation.
It leads me to seek to steer the Nation in a direction as consistent as possible with the principles of the Founding, with Federalism, with the social compact of Locke written into the American  Founding.
It would lead me to promote similar Freedom around the world, to the extent possible.
It would lead me to rely on the Hand of Providence in my decisions.
It would encourage me to avoid War, but to not shrink from defense of the Nation and the Constitution.
It would lead me to pursue policies to strengthen the nation economically, socially, politically, and militarily.
It would lead me to nominate Justices who would be faithful to the Constitution.
It would lead me to pursue economic policies that would produce wealth and economic security, consistent with the principles expounded by F.A. Hayak in his treatise "The Road to Serfdom", and the perspectives of Milton Friedman, e.g.,to pursue free market principles under the rule of law.
It would lead me to seek solutions to current problems consistent with the preamble to the Consitution:  To pursue a more perfect Union, to establish justice, to ensure domestic tranquility, to provide for the common defense, to promote the general welfare, to secure the blessings of liberty.
 
In short, to uphold the Constitution to the best of my ability, and with the aid of Providence.

May the Hand of Providence continue to guide our nation.