Actor, director (of one great movie and one not-great movie), noted supporter of pulling one’s weight, and asteroid namesake Tom Hanks is about as beloved as they come, even though he once called Mormon supporters of California’s Proposition 8 “Un-American” before subsequently backpedaling. Still, we can’t get enough of the man who vanquished a volcano.

Big-time Hanksophiles might already know that for a brief period in his life, Tom Hanks was raised in a quasi-Mormon household.

[pullquote]They convinced my dad’s second wife that being a Mormon was just the greatest thing in the world.[/pullquote]

His second stepmother, Winifred, joined the Church. Tom himself was never baptized and some accounts say a reason Tom’s father eventually split with Winifred was over the Church.

Regardless, that is all hearsay. If you want to hear it from the man himself, listen to the 26 April edition of NPR’s “Fresh Air,” in which, among other things, Tom Hanks talks about the role religion has played in his life.

His first mention of some Mormonism seems cursory, at best, but then Hanks goes into an amiable Hanksian rant about having FHE with the missionaries, magic tricks, and his dad sitting through all of FHE with a beer in hand. It’s amusing, to say the least.



Fast forward to about 30:50 if you want to hear the religion part.

We were so close, folks. At the very least we could have had another Marco Rubio. At best?

Mitt Romney.