Muslim fanatics proudly affirm their intention to replicate the aggressive conquests of their Seventh Century predecessors, but today’s Christians readily acknowledge their vast differences from their Medieval predecessors, just as modern-day Jews recognize that today’s Israel bears very limited functional resemblance to ancient Judea. In this regard, it’s profoundly unfair to judge Mormons of the moment based on long-ago episodes of early Mormon history like the Mountain Meadows Massacre. It’s true that the most embarrassing elements of the LDS past occurred far more recently than the comparably controversial episodes of Christianity or Judaism, but the Mormon Church represents a vastly more recent religious tradition – chartered for the first time on April 6, 1830. The savagery of Mountain Meadows, in other words, occurred just 27 years after the religion’s origination and in the course of the succeeding 150 years it’s hardly been repeated.

By the same token, it’s fascinating to read of Brigham Young’s 51 wives and to debate the old Mormon practice of polygamy, but the church officially repudiated “plural wives” in 1890 and shortly thereafter began excommunicating those who persisted in the practice. In other words, for two thirds of the total history of the LDS faith, the church has sanctioned only monogamous marriage—so trying to tar modern Mormons like Romney with the multiple wives of his long-dead ancestors represents a shamelessly unfair smear tactic. One might as well criticize contemporary Catholics (or Protestants, or Eastern Orthodox, for that matter) for past slaughter of various heretics and unbelievers (including fellow Christians, of course)– since such butchery took up a much higher percentage of the total, 2,000 year history of Christianity than did polygamy of the 177 year history of Mormonism.

3-The only basis for evaluating a religion is the constructive or destructive behavior of its adherents: do their attempts to live their faith make the world around them better or worse? A quick trip to Utah (with its 70% LDS population) should disabuse even the most embittered anti-Mormon fanatic of the notion that this faith amounts to a malevolent cult.

Sure, you’ll find irritating elements of Salt Lake City (or of Provo, for that matter, where I faced profound challenges in securing a desperately needed cup of Mormon-banned coffee during my visit to Brigham Young University) but the statistics about the Beehive State don’t lie: in terms of health, longevity, family life, crime, productivity, and general livability, this Mormon “Promised Land” compares very favorably with its neighbors in the inter-mountain West. Many “gentiles” (non-Mormons) look with admiration at the LDS practice of sending their young people on missionary assignments as part of the maturation process, or reserving one night a week for families to spend time together at home. Recounting stories of the “Mormon Wars” in which early followers of Joseph Smith battled with their often hostile, violent neighbors in Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois, shouldn’t distract attention from the educational, cultural, charitable and business institutions which Mormons have established with indefatigable energy.

Even the scurrilous (and often hilarious) TV cartoon show “South Park,” concluded a 2003 episode ridiculing the story of Joseph Smith and his golden tablets, by acknowledging that today’s Mormons make famously good neighbors, displaying niceness and kindness to an occasionally cloying extent. While it makes perfect sense to condemn Islamo-Nazis for blowing themselves up to slaughter innocent women and children, or to decry the Mungiki for random beheadings and mutilations of females, there’s no similar basis for attacking Mormons because they send eighteen-year-olds on bicycles in skinny ties to witness to people about the descendants of Nephi.

In short, while certain contemporary religious communities richly deserve harsh judgment and even condemnation, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints hardly qualifies as a current danger or a spur to criminal, destructive behavior. You may well disagree with the church’s ban on premarital sex, or social drinking, or showing all R-rated movies (including “Schindler’s List”) on premises it controls (like Brigham Young University), but such disagreements might constitute grounds for leaving the church, not assaulting it from outside.

All religions have not been created equal (whether you believe that God, or man, created them) but in a pluralistic nation like the USA, candidates of any faith that exemplifies good citizenship and neighborliness (as the LDS church most emphatically does) deserve equal respect from prospective voters.