by Debbie Hummel, Associated Press
SALT LAKE CITY - The morning Elizabeth Smart was abducted from her home, family and friends leapt into action. Another key element also awoke that day: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
In Utah, the church is prepared to respond to emergencies – and its members do so quickly and efficiently. Neighbors of the Smart family said they watched the lights of nearby homes turn on, one after another, as people called each other with the terrible news.
“We network a lot, we talk a lot, we hug a lot,” said Bishop David C. Hamblin, the leader of the Smarts’ congregation.
Hamblin was visiting a daughter who had just given birth in San Francisco when Elizabeth was abducted. A church member tracked him down and the bishop and his wife left that day to return to Utah to help as clergy and as friends.
Utah’s state symbol is a beehive – it represents industriousness – a quality Mormons pride themselves on. Church members are encouraged to have a stockpile of supplies in their homes, including food, in case of emergency.
About 70 percent of Utah’s 2.1 million residents are Mormons, and the church’s congregations are segmented into wards of approximately 300 to 500 people.
During the 2002 Winter Olympics, Salt Lake City sought to dispel notions of Utah as an uptight Mormon backwater or a curious enclave of peculiar people who shun alcohol, coffee and outsiders. The church tried to erase the perception that it is a cultish, mysterious creed.
“People have a genuine caring about their neighbors, whether they’re from the predominant religion or not,” said Utah Public Safety Commissioner Robert Flowers. “We have an organized community that takes great pride in helping out.”
A Western attitude of self-reliance is partly the reason, helped by religious leaders who can contact large groups of people quickly. Each ward maintains and distributes a phone directory of members.
“I remember many years ago where we were dealing with flooding and needed people for sandbagging,” Flowers said. “We expected 500 (people) and got 2,000.”
Hours after a tornado tore through Salt Lake City in August 1999, chainsaw-wielding residents were patrolling damaged neighborhoods. Roads and walkways were cleared of fallen trees by the next morning.
On the first day of Elizabeth’s disappearance, church leaders took the unusual step of issuing an official statement that encouraged Mormons to help with the search and to comfort the family.
Hamblin estimates that every person, except for small children, in the Smart’s congregation has turned out to help.
Search coordinators say more than 1,000 volunteers showed up at a search command center the morning after Elizabeth disappeared. The number isn’t exact because they ran out of forms for searchers to sign. About 100 Mormon missionaries were relieved from their proselytizing duties to help search for Elizabeth.
Newell Bringhurst, professor at College of Sequoias in Visalia, Calif., and past president of the Mormon History Association, said the Mormon culture’s focus on community welfare can be traced through their history.
“They started out as a despised, persecuted minority,” Bringhurst said. “They tended to band together and help each other out.”