WITH MITT Romney’s candidacy for president, the Mormon church approaches an epochal moment in its deep engagement with American politics. The nation, too, is at a threshold - entering, perhaps, a more spacious public understanding of many once-marginal groups. In the Mormon case, it’s been a long time coming. Romney may be a front-runner for the Republican nomination, and his father George may once have been a serious candidate for president, but the first Mormon to run for president was the first Mormon himself.

Note: It is a pleasure to have Margaret Blair Young contribute to JI’s monthlong series on issues of Race and Mormonism. Margaret Blair Young has written extensively on Blacks in the western USA and particilarly Black Latter-day Saints. Much of her work has been co-authored with Darius Gray. She authored I Am Jane. The first staged reading of I Am Jane was on the Nelke theater stage at BYU. It was the climax of a playwriting class, and met some deserved criticism. It was, as I recall, about 120 pages. Too many words. The first draft I wrote used a clichéd convention: rebellious teenager dreams about/ learns about/ re-enacts the life of a heroic ancestor and gains self-respect and courage. But such a play is more about the teen than the character whose life I wanted to explore. And I was researching it even as I was scripting the play.

Four years ago, Mitt Romney had a lot going for him -- money, looks, a famous name, executive experience in both the public and private sector, a record of winning statewide in heavily "blue" Massachusetts, and his white knight performance in saving the 2002 winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.

If Mitt Romney wins the presidency, one decision about life in Washington would be made for him: His church. Mormonism mandates that followers attend their assigned local congregation, called a “ward,” and folks at the Third Ward on 16th Street NW are already revved up with excitement. Well, kind of.They’re mostly Democrats, including the sort of Obama supporters Romney was secretly videotaped disparaging in his now-notorious remark about “the 47 percent” of Americans who don’t pay federal taxes.

Members from all over the Philippines are celebrating as their country opens up its 100th LDS stake.

What an incredible accomplishment.

Two plays about Mormonism are scheduled to premiere shortly in the northeastern United States. According to advance publicity, one of them "chronicles the days leading up to Christmas, 1825, when Joseph Smith Jr. and his father, on the run from the law as confidence men and scammers, return in disgrace to the family farm in upstate New York to save their house from being repossessed. In the process of escaping the clutches of both their creditors and the investors they'd recently fleeced, they lay the foundations of Mormonism." It purports to be "based on historical accounts of Mormonism's early years." The other play, a musical, will likely be somewhat less reverent.

As the "Mormon moment" extends into 2012, the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life Thursday releases a groundbreaking new survey, the first ever published by a non-LDS research organization to focus exclusively on members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and their beliefs, values, perceptions and political preferences.Entitled "Mormons in America: Certain in Their Beliefs, Uncertain of Their Place in Society," the survey was conducted between Oct. 25 and Nov. 16, 2011, among a national sample of 1,019 respondents who identified themselves as Mormons. The results validate a number of long-held stereotypes (most American Mormons are white, well-educated, politically conservative and religiously observant) while providing a few interesting surprises (care for the poor and needy is high on the list of LDS priorities, while drinking coffee and watching R-rated movies aren't as taboo among the rank and file as you might think).

When Richard L. Elliott seats himself at the polished cherrywood of the Conference Center organ in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, the 7,667 wind-powered pipes translate the music of his soul into something others can enjoy.

Celebrated news anchor Tom Brokaw joins the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the Orchestra at Temple Square for a special Music and the Spoken Word which commemorates the ten-year anniversary of 9/11. The special, entitled “9/11: Rising Above,” will air on radio, television, cable networks and Internet channels around the country.Choir music director Mack Wilberg said the program will focus on how Americans have risen above the grief and loss of that September day. “The message of this show is that—as individuals and as a nation—we can find healing and strength in adversity and literally rise above all the negatives.”