The ironies of history

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is building new temples all over the world. It is a curious phenomenon that the construction of these buildings stirs a tremendous amount of opposition, such as has been reported recently regarding the zoning hearings for a new temple in Phoenix, Arizona.

Whenever we announce a new temple or a meetinghouse, our adversaries inevitably try to block construction using zoning regulations. They devise various reasons to oppose the construction--not on the grounds of anti-Mormon bigotry--but because it would block their mountain view or change the "residential character" of their neighborhoods.

The latter excuse was the one used by opponents of the original site of the Nashville Temple. When the Church abandoned hope of building on that location, they simply purchased a lot in another suburb of Nashville and built the temple there. The Church sold the site originally planned to build on to a Baptist congregation that built a church on the site. Isn't it ironic that the opponents who said building a "church" would disrupt the "residential character" of their neighborhood didn't complain a bit when the Baptists built a church on the exact same location.

Just like the people who start their blogs with "I'm not anti-Mormon, but..." nobody wants to be an anti-Mormon. They know its wrong to hate Mormons and let bigotry dominate their thoughts, so they come up with clever excuses to mask their prejudice. This is not a new thing. It has been that way since the beginnings of the Church. The funny thing is that, despite their stated reasons, it always seems to be the case that later circumstances will reveal their true motives.

I've been reading Nauvoo: A Place of Peace, People of Promise by historian Glen M. Leonard. It's a fascinating book and I've learned a lot from it. There was a real lesson in the aftermath of Nauvoo from some details I had never read before.

Why were the saints forced to leave this beautiful city and the temple they built in just a few short years? Why could their neighbors not tolerate them? Was it simply because they were an unusual religion that practiced some principles of cooperative, communitarian living? Was it because they were clannish and had a strong community identity? Was it because of their "utopian" dreams to create a society apart from others, avoiding intermingling with the wickedness of the world? Was it because they worked together to mutual benefit, unfairly competing with non-Mormon merchants and businessess? Was it because they had a single, charismatic religious leader who taught doctrines that mainstream churches considered controversial?

If you were to ask the anti-Mormons who drove the Mormons from their homes in Nauvoo, those were the very reasons they gave for their opposition and their aggressive acts towards the saints.

Within two years of the saints abandoning the city of Nauvoo, a religious group let by Etienne Cabet, a charismatic Frenchman and his followers, bought up much of the properties that were available at dirt cheap prices. This religious group was known as the Icarians. They came to Nauvoo to build factories, farms and schools. They bought up abandoned houses for the price of the back taxes. They purchased the temple block and the burned out shell of the temple for about $2000. (The value of the temple had been estimated at nearly $8 million--an amazing sum for that day!)

The state denied the Icarians a city charter, because they didn't want a repeat of the Mormon episode in Nauvoo. Accoring to the book's author, the "temporary setbacks did not deter the Icarians from pursuing their dream. Residents and visitors alike complimented them on their orderly, industrious, virtuous approach to life. They operated a sawmill, a large flour mill, a brewery, a distillery, two weekly newspapers (one in French), and a communal vegetable garden and orchard. They exported local products to St. Louis. They preached against smoking, dressed uniformly and simply, ate in a common dining hall, emphasized education, and resolved community issues through deliberation and arbitration." (Leonard, p. 630)

In other words, they sound a lot like the latter-day saints who lived there before them. Oddly, there were no anti-Icarian mobs. There were no burnings of homes, crops, or shooting of the Icarian's livestock. No one assassinated their leader. No one published anti-Icarian newspapers demanding that they be driven out with "powder and ball." The state militia and the federal government left them alone.

The group maintained a presence there until 1855, when internal disputes over leadership roles began to divide them. Etienne Cabet died of a stroke (unlike the Mormon founder who was brutally murdered by a mob of some 200 men). Some of the Icarians moved on to Iowa, some to California. The scattered groups lasted until the 1880s. A few Icarians remained behind in Nauvoo and died there eventually under peaceful conditions, unmolested by their neighbors.

Looking at the aftermath of Nauvoo, why were the Mormon's neighbors so hostile and bent on their destruction, yet they easily tolerated the Icarians, who for all intents and purposes were very similar in their society to early latter-day saints? What was the difference? Let me propose an answer: the keys of the kingdom.

Satan had no reason to stir up opposition against the Icarians. They were another docile religious sect that could never threaten the Adversary's dominion. Joseph Smith and his followers possessed the keys of the kingdom of God, the same ones that were given to Peter and the ancient apostles. If we look at history, the world persecuted the apostles until they were gone. Only a short time after their death, Christian persecution virtually ceased in the Roman Empire. Once the keys were gone, Satan's dominion was secure for nearly 1800 years. When those keys were restored to the Prophet Joseph, God's power threatened Satan's kingdom all over again.

Modern sectarians, atheists, progressives, and others who oppose the Church will never tell you the real reasons behind their feelings. They may not even know why they hate Mormons or admit that they do. The acceptance of the Icarians by those who had persecuted and driven out the latter-day saints exposed the true reasons for their hatred and bigotry. None of the reasons given by the anti-Mormons in Nauvoo, for their anti-Mormon feelings, was true. The truth was that they were wicked people, who gave Satan access to their hearts, and he exercised his influence to engender hateful feelings towards those who threatened his hold on those same hearts.

To this day, persecution, derision, and hate continue to follow the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, its leaders, and its members. This is because Satan knows who holds the keys in our day. He will always fight to destroy them because he knows that those keys will one day bind him and eventually cast him out of "the Garden" one last, final time.