Never Too Late to Say We're Sorry

Last week, a delegation of government officials from the State of Illinois traveled to Utah to deliver a long overdue apology to the Mormon church. One hundred sixty years ago, the founder of the Mormon church, Joseph Smith, and his brother, were dragged from a jail cell in downstate Illinois and murdered by a mob. They were in jail awaiting trial, charged with the destruction of a printing press that published anti-Mormon newspaper articles. Law enforcement officials did nothing to protect the Smiths.

Shortly after this, the governor of Illinois ordered all Mormons to leave the state immediately, or else they would be forcibly evicted. The Mormons had come to Illinois in the 1840s because they were chased out of New York State and Ohio. People there did not like their beliefs. They purchased some swamp land in the western Illinois and built a town they named Nauvoo. Soon, Nauvoo flourished and its population increased so much that is was almost bigger than Chicago. Since the Mormons tended to vote as a bloc, city leaders in Chicago were afraid that Chicago would lose its influence over state government. People in the towns surrounding Nauvoo began to resent the Mormons' economic power.

The Mormons left en masse (as a group) and traveled by wagon train to what they then established as Salt Lake City. Salt Lake City eventually became the capital of the new state of Utah, which is predominantly Mormon even today.

Today, Mormon church leaders are thrilled by this gesture on the part of the Illinois officials. Many Mormons in Utah are direct descendants of the people chased out of Illinois. According to the Chicago Tribune , the idea to apologize-even at this late date-came from a dinner party. Appellate Court Judge Anne Burke and her husband, Chicago Alderman Edward Burke, hosted a dinner party a year ago to which they invited some Mormon friends. Over dinner, the Burkes, both of whom are Catholic, learned for the first time about the tragic history of the Mormons in Illinois. The story haunted Judge Burke especially, who launched the initiative to have the state assembly issue a formal apology.

Catholic Connections

"The purification of memory aims at liberating personal and communal conscience from all forms of resentment and violence that are the legacy of past faults. This should lead-if done correctly-to a corresponding recognition of guilt and contribute to the path of reconciliation. Such a process can have a significant effect on the present precisely because the consequences of past faults still make themselves felt and can persist as tensions in the present.
The purification of memory is thus an act of courage and humility in recognizing the wrongs done by those who have borne or who bear the name 'Christian.' It is based on the conviction that because the bond which unites us to one another in the mystical body of Christ, though not personally responsible, bear the burden of the errors and faults of those who have gone before us."
The International Theological Commission, "Memory and Reconciliation: The Church and the Faults of the Past." March 2000

Reflection Questions

Why is it important for followers of Jesus to eat and drink together with people whom they otherwise might see as enemies, foreigners, or outcasts?

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