The morning of December 2, 2004, I received a visitation from one of the lesser angels in the Mormon pantheon. I could tell she was a lesser angel because, unlike most Mormon angels, instead of appearing in resplendent white robes, brighter than the noon-day sun, she wore a plain, ankle-length blue and white calico dress, and matching bonnet.

After I'd gotten over the shock of seeing a strange, yet most charming woman outside my bedroom door at seven-o-five in the morning, she said in a sweet English accent, "Don't throw the baby out with the bath water."

I said, "Say what?"

"D o n ' t     t h r o w     t h e     b a b y     o u t     w i t h     t h e     b a t h     w a t e r," she said really slowly, as though she thought I were completely thick.

"OK, OK!" I said, "I get it, don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Now who the heck are you?"

She introduced herself as "Martha," and explained that in 1842 at the tender age of nineteen she had immigrated from England to the Mormon settlement of Nauvoo, Illinois. The Prophet Joseph Smith had shown up at her doorstep and explained how the Lord had commanded her to marry him on the spot or else she would be eternally damned and destroyed. While almost all of the forty other women Joseph had done this to said yes because it was what the prophet told them to do, Martha had put Brother Joseph off by asking him to give her one night to pray about it. Then she packed her bags and took the next coach to St. Louis.

"Well, you and I have something in common, then," I said, "Because I'm an ex-Mormon too."

"Well, I didn't say I was an ex-Mormon," she remonstrated.

"You didn't leave the church after what happened to you?" I asked incredulously, "But then why did you leave Nauvoo?"

"Well, I left Nauvoo because I realized that was the only way to convince Brother Joseph to leave me alone. But I still kept my faith in the gospel, and I've cherished it ever since!" she exclaimed. "And that's why I'm here to tell you, Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater."

"Argh!" I said, "Mormonism is all bathwater. There's no baby! After what you just told me, you of all people can't see that?"

Angel Martha gave me the kind of penetrating look only angels can give. It made me extremely nervous. "Now you and I both know that's not true," she insisted. "If you really thought there was nothing redeeming about Mormonism, then why do you write about nothing else?"

"To criticize it," I said defensively.

"We only criticize what we love," she said curtly.

"OK," I said, "OK. There's good in everything. So what?"

"Well, I've come here to ask you to do something. I'd like you to go to Utah for a week, from July twenty-fourth through July thirty-first."

"Utah!" I groaned.

"Utah," she replied.

I said, "I'm gay. Do you realize that over eighty -- count them eighty -- percent of Utah voted for George W. Bush? Utah was the reddest fucking state in the union and you want me to go there of all places now?"

"Don't swear," she said, "And yes, I want you to go there."

"Why?" I asked.

"Never you mind why. Some things are meant to be a test of faith, so you can go or not go, but I won't tell you why. You'll find out if you go."

With that, she curtsied politely, lifted the hem of her dress, and slowly walked up an invisible spiral staircase and vanished through my ceiling.

Well, needless to say, I debated and argued and raged. But when push came to shove, I decided to do what Angel Martha asked. After all, when an angel bothers to show up in your hallway at seven-o-five in the morning, it's usually for a good reason.

I booked the plane tickets, and lo and behold, shortly thereafter I received an email from a former history professor of mine from BYU. He had been my very favorite professor at BYU, and in 1993 he was excommunicated for showing that Mormon women had been ordained in the 1840s, and then he came out publicly as a gay man. So of course I've wanted to see him again, but never had the chance. And it just so happened he was going to be in Utah that very week, from July twenty-fourth through thirty-first to speak at the Sunstone Symposium, this big annual conference of Mormons who are -- how can I say it delicately -- open-minded. Well, then the light of heaven clicked on, just as if some angel somewhere had flipped a switch, and I knew what I was supposed to do.

The conference was at the downtown Salt Lake Sheraton. Salt Lake is impossible to get lost in, since it's on this huge numbered grid, with big wide streets where you can see everything from everywhere. So I ended up arriving really early. So I was sitting on a big comfy sofa in the lobby waiting for the first session to start when I met another angel.

This one was also clearly one of the lesser angels, nobody famous like John the Baptist or Moroni. He wore a neatly pressed dark suit, starched collar, and one of those thin silk bow ties that were all the rage in the 1870s. He was delicate but handsome, with a big, unruly shock of brown hair that he couldn't seem to comb in place. He appeared right on the sofa next to me, swung his arms around my shoulders and planted a big wet kiss right on my cheek. (Mormon angels are quite corporeal.)

"So glad you could make it," he said.

"Well, I guess I am too, now," I said, "Who are you?"

This one introduced himself as Bruce, the son of one of the early Mormon prophets. When he was a missionary in Hawaii, the natives affectionately referred to him as aikane, their word for a man who loves men. "There's a session on homosexuality and the church," he said, "Don't miss it." With that, he gave me another gentle peck on the cheek and then vanished through the wall behind us, saying that there was a session he really wanted to attend about Mormons organizing to challenge racism.

"There are Mormons challenging racism?" I asked.

"Yup," he said, as he vanished.

Well, perusing the topics in my program, I saw what I was dealing with. Mormon feminists. Ex-Mormons and excommunicated Mormons. Mormon moms protesting abuse. Gay Mormons. Black Mormons. Mormon intellectuals protesting anti-intellectualism. Polygamists and fundamentalists and heretics. At some point, I was listening to some talk where this woman was critiquing a new Mormon catechism, and she was sharing her vision of a Mormon church where women were equal to men, gay people were fully embraced, restitution was made for the wrongs of racism, non-Mormons' beliefs were respected and honored, and sexual abuse was confronted and challenged so that everyone could feel safe. And somewhere in the middle of that talk I began to feel this itchy, odd feeling sort of twitching around inside of me. My whole body was filling with this incredible warmth like a burning fire that radiated from my heart out into my extremities, and my eyes began to fill with tears.

I have to admit, that wasn't the most comfortable or comprehensible feeling to feel. What the hell do warm, fuzzy, Holy Ghosty feelings mean in the state with the highest suicide rate in the country?

The gay session was the last one I attended. On the panel was this lonely, attractive gay guy who had survived a suicide attempt and managed to make it through three separate attempts to expel him from BYU. A family psychologist from Idaho State University had made a documentary about his obedience to the church policy of life-long celibacy for homosexuals. I wanted to get up and shout, "Who cares about church policies? Why are Mormons so God-damned submissive? Why can't we start disobeying?"

I was about to slip out just so I could stop feeling so angry, when someone reached over and took my hand, and leaned over and whispered gently in my ear, "Wait. Just wait."

It was my friend, Angel Bruce. So I waited.

After the presentation, they gave out free DVD copies of the documentary to everyone. "Take extras," the brother psychologist said, "If you're planning to give one to your bishop."

I reluctantly took a copy. "I suppose I could give it to my parents," I thought. It wasn't a bad video. I didn't hate it. It was an honest portrayal of a gay man's struggle to come to terms with his sexuality. But I didn't like it either. All I needed was for my parents to watch it and come away saying, "Gee! See? You could be celibate, John, and then everything would be O.K."

But after the presentation, Angel Bruce took me aside in the hallway. "When I was a missionary in Hawaii, I actually had to learn to speak Hawaiian. What language did you speak on your mission in France?" he asked.

"Have you ever tried speaking English to a Frenchman?" I replied.

"Well then," he said, "Be sure you send your parents that video." He took me by the hands, kissed me full on the lips, and then disappeared again. "See you next year," his disembodied voice called to me.

"Next year?" I shouted. "What do you mean next year?"

It wasn't until a month or so after I returned to Minnesota that Angel Martha made her second appearance. I almost flipped out of my hammock when she materialized on our sun porch.

"Hello, John," she said cheerfully, "How was Utah?"

"Oh, it wasn't so bad," I said.

"How did your parents like the video you sent them?" she asked.

"Well," I said, "I just talked to my dad on the phone last night. He said he felt sorry for the guy in the video. My Republican, Fox-News-watching Dad actually said it convinced him how wrong it was to make gay people be celibate. He actually said something positive about legalizing gay marriage."

"Well, so the Prophet Joseph was right about at least one thing," she said.

"Ugh, this again," I growled impatiently, "So what was the prophet Joseph right about?" I hate it when angels act all smug.

"Let the people have the facts and eventually they will decide to do what is right on their own," she smiled.

"So what? So now what? Are you going to send me back to Utah?"

"No," she said, "I want you to stay right here in Minnesota. But I do want you to do something."

At this point, I was almost too exasperated for words. "I still can't believe you're here talking about sending me on missions. I got myself excommunicated twenty years ago fair and square, almost committed suicide, and I think I've earned the right not to have to spend my time listening to angels quote the Prophet Joseph. You know what I have to say about Joseph? The Book of Mormon is full of shit because American Indians came across the Bering Land Bridge thirty thousand years ago, not from Jerusalem in 600 B.C., end of story. Joseph was a fraud and a manipulator who had a private army and a holy order of secret assassins, and if he could have, he would have turned America into a Mormon version of the Taliban. He stole other men's wives, he slept with fourteen-year-old girls, and the church has been justifying the unjustifiable ever since, and making life miserable for anybody like me who is different in any way, or who dares to disagree. So leave me the fuck alone."

The Angel Martha glared right back at me with a look of determination that made me understand how she had managed not to be intimidated even when the prophet of the Mormon Church came a-knocking at her door.

"Well, Brother Joseph was wrong about polygamy, and about a whole wagon-load of other things too numerous to discuss. But I am here to tell you that none of that matters, because regardless of what Brother Joseph was or did, thanks to him you are here. The Mormon Church exists and you exist. You need to let go of your anger. God is far more loving and good and forgiving than anything you can imagine, and if you just hang in there and have faith, everything will work out for the best. Absolutely everything! Just trust me on this," she said.

"So why are you telling me this?"

"Because everything you do on your side of the veil has a direct impact on eternity. Everything you do and say and believe in this life matters, and God needs you. That was another thing the prophet Joseph was right about."

"Jesus fucking Christ," I said.

"Don't swear," she said, "and don't take the Lord's name in vain. Just do something. Reach out to people you hate and fear. If you reach out in love some will listen."

"OK," I said, "OK, I get it."

"I'll be in touch," Martha said, as she opened an invisible door, stepped through it, and closed it primly behind her, "I'll want to know what you've done to make a difference."

Every single thing the Angel Martha told me made me angry, but I had to admit it was true. Because in spite of what I think I know, I am feeling strangely hopeful, and I found that hope in the unlikeliest of places, in the capital of the most Republican state of the Union under the spires of the Salt Lake Temple. That evening, I sat down at my computer and drafted an email to the national director of Affirmation: Gay and Lesbian Mormons, to discuss with him what I might do to start to make a difference in the Mormon Church. I've decided it's time for me to speak hope with my native people in my native tongue.