Controversy dwarfs debate - Religion again moves to the fore after Huckabee apologizes for raising questions about the Mormon faith.

The controversy, which overshadowed a GOP debate here, came less than a week after Romney, who had been leading in Iowa polls, delivered a speech aimed at overcoming any political impediment posed by his membership in the Mormon church.

And it was the latest instance of the newly ascendant Huckabee having to explain his statements now that he is facing closer scrutiny.

The fracas stemmed from comments Huckabee made in an interview with the New York Times Magazine, set to appear this weekend. The former Arkansas governor -- an ordained Southern Baptist minister -- was asked if he considered Mormonism to be a "cult or religion."

"I think it's a religion. I really don't know much about it," Huckabee replied. Then he posed a question of his own: "Don't Mormons believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?"

A church spokesman refuted the notion, as did Romney.

The former governor of Massachusetts said there was nothing wrong with a candidate drawing contrasts on issues, "but I think attacking someone's religion is really going too far," Romney said on NBC's "Today Show." "It's just not the American way, and I think people will reject that."

The matter did not come up during Wednesday's debate. But afterward, Huckabee said he privately apologized to Romney.

"I said I would never try, ever, to try to somehow pick out some point of your faith and make it, you know, an issue, and I wouldn't," Huckabee said on CNN. "I told him face to face, I said, 'I don't think your being a Mormon ought to make you more or less qualified for being a president.' That has been my position."

Some, however, think Huckabee's comment was not as innocent as he suggested, especially after he ran a TV ad in Iowa in which he discussed faith and the words "Christian Leader" flashed across the screen.

His surge in the polls -- he is now leading in some Iowa surveys -- has stemmed from strong support among evangelical Christians, many of whom view the Mormon faith with a mix of suspicion and hostility.

"It's how you raise doubts about somebody without looking like you're cheap and untoward," Quin Monson, an expert on religion and politics at Brigham Young University, said of Huckabee's comment. "You'd be able to dismiss it if he weren't sending subtle cues in other ways, like in his advertising."