people his age were being shipped to Vietnam, Romney’s life was heading in a very different direction.
T he letter came as Romney completed his year at Stanford. “Your presiding officers have recommended you as one worthy to represent the Church of our Lord as a Minister of the Gospel,” wrote Mormon Church president David O. McKay, whom members revered as a living prophet. From the very start, in the 1830s, the Latter-day Saints had sent out young envoys to preach the Gospel and try to win converts. It was a missionary who had convinced Mitt’s great-great grandparents in England to convert and immigrate to America, and many Romneys had followed the tradition. George had done a mission in England. Now Mitt learned that he would be going to France. It sounded like one of the easier assignments. Some missionaries went to jungles and deserts and islands, while Mitt was off to one of the most cultured societies on the planet. But heavily Catholic France was a society mostly hostile to Mormons. Most French citizens, if they knew anything about Mormonism, were familiar with its history of polygamy and, in a country that takes its wine seriously, for its prohibition against alcohol.
The first Mormon missionary had arrived in France in 1849, but the missionaries had been evicted during the reign of Napoléon III and been evacuated during World War II. In the 1950s, a growing number of missionaries in France had questioned the tenets of Mormonism and embraced other faiths, a scandal that had resulted in nine members being excommunicated. The church had rebounded with a campaign to build chapels in France, and the first two, in Bordeaux and Paris, opened just before Romney arrived. Still, despite more than a century of missionary activity, Mormonism had barely taken root. There were 6,500 Mormons out of 49 million people in France by the time Romney prepared for his mission.
L ess than two months after Romney left Stanford, he was on his way to the gritty seaport of Le Havre, best known to Americans for being occupied by the Germans during World War II. Horrific bombing had led to the deaths of thousands of residents and the destruction of much of the city. With the end of the war, the French government had undertaken one of the greatest rebuilding efforts in Europe. Over a twenty-year period, Le Havre had been remade into a modernist ideal. It was a long way from the sunny setting of Stanford and its Mission Revival–style architecture. In Le Havre, blocks of boxy concrete buildings surrounded the 351-foot-high spire of the Church of Saint Joseph. The spire served as a memorial to the war dead and a symbol of the traditional Catholic faith of the region. Feelings about Americans had veered from warmth to wariness as World War II receded into memory and the Vietnam conflict wore on. The mayor and other top city officials were Communists, adding to the anti-American sentiment but also fueling hope among the missionaries that some irreligious citizens might be curious about the Mormon message. Into this world of concrete, communism, and Catholicism came the gangly nineteen-year-old, selling something that very few people in Le Havre were interested in buying: a new religion.
Romney shared a one-bedroom apartment with three other missionaries. They put together makeshift beds by getting used mattresses from a ship in port and stacking plywood atop cinder blocks. There was no telephone, no television, and no radio. There were also no other Mormons in Le Havre, so the four American missionaries would hold worship in their apartment, taking turns preaching and singing and offering one another the sacrament of bread and water. Romney and his three fellow missionaries woke at 6 a.m., ate breakfast, and studied the Bible, the Book of Mormon, and French. They knocked on doors, with breaks for meals, and went to bed as required at 10 p.m. They traveled on Solex motorized bicycles, wearing their suits and carrying satchels containing
T he letter came as Romney completed his year at Stanford. “Your presiding officers have recommended you as one worthy to represent the Church of our Lord as a Minister of the Gospel,” wrote Mormon Church president David O. McKay, whom members revered as a living prophet. From the very start, in the 1830s, the Latter-day Saints had sent out young envoys to preach the Gospel and try to win converts. It was a missionary who had convinced Mitt’s great-great grandparents in England to convert and immigrate to America, and many Romneys had followed the tradition. George had done a mission in England. Now Mitt learned that he would be going to France. It sounded like one of the easier assignments. Some missionaries went to jungles and deserts and islands, while Mitt was off to one of the most cultured societies on the planet. But heavily Catholic France was a society mostly hostile to Mormons. Most French citizens, if they knew anything about Mormonism, were familiar with its history of polygamy and, in a country that takes its wine seriously, for its prohibition against alcohol.
The first Mormon missionary had arrived in France in 1849, but the missionaries had been evicted during the reign of Napoléon III and been evacuated during World War II. In the 1950s, a growing number of missionaries in France had questioned the tenets of Mormonism and embraced other faiths, a scandal that had resulted in nine members being excommunicated. The church had rebounded with a campaign to build chapels in France, and the first two, in Bordeaux and Paris, opened just before Romney arrived. Still, despite more than a century of missionary activity, Mormonism had barely taken root. There were 6,500 Mormons out of 49 million people in France by the time Romney prepared for his mission.
L ess than two months after Romney left Stanford, he was on his way to the gritty seaport of Le Havre, best known to Americans for being occupied by the Germans during World War II. Horrific bombing had led to the deaths of thousands of residents and the destruction of much of the city. With the end of the war, the French government had undertaken one of the greatest rebuilding efforts in Europe. Over a twenty-year period, Le Havre had been remade into a modernist ideal. It was a long way from the sunny setting of Stanford and its Mission Revival–style architecture. In Le Havre, blocks of boxy concrete buildings surrounded the 351-foot-high spire of the Church of Saint Joseph. The spire served as a memorial to the war dead and a symbol of the traditional Catholic faith of the region. Feelings about Americans had veered from warmth to wariness as World War II receded into memory and the Vietnam conflict wore on. The mayor and other top city officials were Communists, adding to the anti-American sentiment but also fueling hope among the missionaries that some irreligious citizens might be curious about the Mormon message. Into this world of concrete, communism, and Catholicism came the gangly nineteen-year-old, selling something that very few people in Le Havre were interested in buying: a new religion.
Romney shared a one-bedroom apartment with three other missionaries. They put together makeshift beds by getting used mattresses from a ship in port and stacking plywood atop cinder blocks. There was no telephone, no television, and no radio. There were also no other Mormons in Le Havre, so the four American missionaries would hold worship in their apartment, taking turns preaching and singing and offering one another the sacrament of bread and water. Romney and his three fellow missionaries woke at 6 a.m., ate breakfast, and studied the Bible, the Book of Mormon, and French. They knocked on doors, with breaks for meals, and went to bed as required at 10 p.m. They traveled on Solex motorized bicycles, wearing their suits and carrying satchels containing
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