With shift to global focus, the LDS Church may be leaving the American political arena

It is no surprise that Latter-day Saints have an outsized love for July Fourth, the day to celebrate the birth of America.

After all, the United States is where Mormons believe founder Joseph Smith saw God and Jesus in a New York grove of trees, where the nascent church was founded.

And for most of its nearly 200-year history, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been dominated by Americans, has sometimes endorsed major U.S. policies (including the invasion of Iraq) and has celebrated the nation as a divinely endorsed “land of promise.”

These days, though, the 17.2 million-member church sees itself — and its political principles — less parochially and more globally.

It has not, for example, taken sides in the Russia-Ukraine war and plans to remove all national anthems from its hymnals.

Though the majority of American Latter-day Saints lean Republican, the Utah-based faith maintains strict political neutrality, while declaring that “some principles compatible with the gospel may be found in various political parties.”

The church urges members to “seek candidates who best embody” those principles. Members should also study candidates carefully and vote for those who have “demonstrated integrity, compassion and service to others, regardless of party affiliation.”

BYU professor explores faith and politics

Richard Davis, an emeritus political science professor at church-owned Brigham Young University, set out to discover what that meant to Latter-day Saint politicians.

He enlisted the aid of several BYU students to interview more than 70 politicians across the globe, the country and Utah, then chose 25 to highlight in his book, “Faith and Politics: Latter-day Saint Politicians Tell Their Stories.”

International politicians featured in the book include five Europeans, a Canadian and an African. U.S. politicians from outside the West included three Republicans and a Democrat, in offices ranging from city council member to congressional representative.

Western politicians included the late Harry Reid, the five-term U.S. senator from Nevada who became the highest-ranking elected Latter-day Saint in the nation’s history when he captured the title of Senate majority leader.

Utah politicos include Republican Deidre Henderson, Utah’s current lieutenant governor, Democrat Brian King, a longtime Utah representative who is now running for governor, and several former federal and state officials.

How, Davis wondered, did these men and women navigate their faith and their public positions? Should these believers even engage in the world of politics?

Is political involvement anathema to faith?

“Isn’t politics dirty?” Davis says some members ask. “Doesn’t that mean a church member would have to compromise his or her principles, verbally attack others, or become part of one group or political party that attacks another group?”

Davis found their answers insightful and even inspiring.

“These politicians revealed, sometimes quite poignantly,” he writes in the introduction, “how they handle the tensions they face in government office while seeking to retain their faith and practice.”

The political scientist was moved, he says in an interview, by the politicians’ candor about “the challenges they faced, such as anti-Mormon hostility, gender bias within LDS culture, or personal conflict with other politicians, and how the teachings of the gospel helped them through those challenges.”

The book is divided into four parts by geography: international, U.S. outside the West, U.S. inside the West, and Utah.

Davis was seeking an array of political opinions and perspectives, he says, from liberal to conservative, from women and men, from outside the United States to inside the Mountain West and the Beehive State, from the smallest municipal elections to state and federal levels.

He especially wanted to highlight the positions of faithful Latter-day Saint Democrats, who are often demonized by the faith’s Republican majority, many of whom believe that party is not compatible with the church.

Davis himself was long associated with the Democratic Party as one of its leaders in Utah County, and then later helped found the United Utah Party to “reach across party lines” and favor “moderation rather than extremism.”

He showcased in his book the increasing number of Latter-day Saint women who are stepping up politically.

As a global faith, the church “is very different than it was 50 or even 20 years ago,” Davis says, “when it defended American policies like the Vietnam War or going into Iraq.”

The change makes sense for church leaders to watch their rhetoric, he says. “They can’t be in the business of being an American church defending U.S. politics if they are going to send missionaries to countries that don’t share those views.”

‘Negative perceptions about Latter-day Saints’

Being in a tiny minority in some countries means it can be difficult for a Latter-day Saint to be, say, a European member of Parliament or an African mayor.

Those in Davis’ book described the issues they faced, including “negative perceptions about Latter-day Saints … and the challenge of representing constituencies where few share their religious affiliation.”

But their involvement can also produce “goodwill toward Latter-day Saints,” Davis writes, and “can signal to a broader public that Latter-day Saints are good citizens.”

In general, European Latter-day Saint politicians are more diverse politically, says Ralf Grünke, a German who won a seat on the Nidderau City Council as an independent on the Green Party ballot while also serving as an Latter-day Saint bishop.

“The political spectrum among Latter-day Saints being active in politics … is much broader [in Europe] than it is in Utah,” Grünke says in the book. “I know Latter-day Saints … who are active in conservative parties, the Social Democrat Party, the former Communist Party, the Free Democrats, the Green Party, my little party, far right, far left, anything back and forth, if at all.”

Grünke can’t cite any research on this issue but has the impression “that on Continental Europe, church members tend to lean toward the political left.”

Davis agrees.

Even politicians considered “conservative” on that Continent, he says, “are much more liberal than conservatives in the U.S.”

Running for office in a male-dominated culture

Of the 25 politicians in this book, nine are women — a higher percentage, Davis notes, than Latter-day Saint women who actually serve in public office.

He purposely “overrepresented women” to showcase their perspectives within Utah, the western United States and beyond.

“It was intended,” Davis says, “to offer models for future involvement by Latter-day Saint women.”

These women have to work against the perspectives from a male-dominated culture, says Aimee Winder Newton, a Republican who ran for Utah governor in 2020.

“We grow up seeing mostly male leaders. On Sundays, we see men who are sitting up on the stand,” she says in the book. “We have a very patriarchal culture, and I don’t think a lot of people are used to seeing female leaders.”

During her campaign, Winder Newton received text messages saying, “Women don’t belong in government or the law,” or, “You need to be home cooking meals and cleaning your house instead of doing this.”

She brushed it off, she says, and focused on policies. Now, Winder Newton sits on the Salt Lake County Council, where the leadership is all women.

Her perspective on faith in politics mirrors other men and women in the book.

“I have Jesus Christ as my role model on how we should treat people … I am able to be very empathetic towards other people and put myself in their shoes,” she says. “... I also have a desire for unity and peace, and I think that’s something that comes from church teachings.”

Challenges of getting involved

Several of the Latter-day Saint politicians mentioned their two-year church missions as a catalyst for their careers in public service.

Ben McAdams, a Democratic ex-U.S. representative from Utah and a former Salt Lake County mayor, was concerned about the poverty he saw in Brazil, while Andria Tupola, a Republican member of the Hawaii House of Representatives from 2015 to 2019 and current member of the Honolulu City Council, wanted to fight government corruption that she witnessed in Venezuela.

Others were asked by friends or mentors to jump into the political arena. However, that is not often the case for those outside Latter-day Saint-dominated areas.

“There may be no one there to invite them to participate,” Davis writes, which could “harm the church’s ability to interact with government in these areas.”

Still, Davis believes Latter-day Saint politicians could play an increasingly crucial role in the worldwide public sphere.

“It is vital,” he concludes, that everyone engaged in political activity “see every other person, whether we agree with them or not, as a child of God.”

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