Blessed Are the Firefighters: Putting Out the Fires of Division

Gay Mormon short stories by an important Latter-day Saint writer.

A girl is haunted by Joseph Smith's wife. A timid gay man unleashes his inner beast through a role-playing game. A plastic surgeon accidentally discovers a new life form. God's wives fight for supremacy amongst themselves. Two women switched at birth have to decide to which eternal family they belong. And much more.

Gay Mormons make quilts, get shot, and become prophets.

The Golem of Prague is really Rabbi Loew's secret lover.

Essays on gay rights, the environment, and universal healthcare.

Stories of Mormons struggling to conform to Church teachings.

The secret lives and hidden desires of Mormon missionaries.

Mormons and Ex-Mormons grapple with the difficulties of life.

Mormon mission president and his missionaries defect from the Church.

At Judgment Day, Mormon misfits face their eternal fate.

In these stories, a missionary copes with the startling discovery that his companion has been translated off the face of the Earth. A lonely woman gives birth to a child fathered by one of the Three Nephites. A schizophrenic woman leads a secret life no one in her congregation suspects.

The scriptures tell us that in the Last Days, wickedness will increase upon the Earth. When the Mormon Church sees a rise in the number of gay members, they believe the end is upon them. But sometimes, being gay provides just the right ingredient to create saints.

The stories in this collection of the Mormon faithful show that while moats may be good at keeping people out who want to come in, they are also quite effective at keeping people in who want to get out. And the stench from their fetid waters often proves unbearable.

Mental illness can strike the faithful as easily as anyone else. But often religious doctrine and practice exacerbate rather than alleviate these problems. From schizophrenia to obsessive-compulsive disorder, from persecution complex to sexual dysfunction, Mormons must cope with their mental as well as their spiritual health on a daily basis.

The battle to direct legislation and policy often seems to be a fight between greed and compassion. Emotions run high, but the problems being debated—climate change, universal healthcare, LGBTQ rights, gun regulation, economic inequality, and the separation of church and state—desperately need to be resolved.

Do you yell at the TV while watching the news? Do you repost maddening articles on Facebook? Do you find yourself overwhelmed by the 200 new political emails in your inbox every day? Left, right, center, far left, or far right, we must work together to address climate change.

Stories of trans and gay Mormons balancing their spiritual and temporal lives. Essays on gun reform, universal healthcare, and climate change. Concluding with a handful—and mouthful—of erotic tales based on the author’s experiences in a French Quarter gay bookstore and as a young missionary in Italy.

By aligning themselves over the past sixty years with the most conservative wing of the Republican Party, Mormons became leading contributors to the cultural and moral decay of America. Instead of a land of freedom, justice, and peace, religious conservatives have made America a place of imprisonment, poverty, and oppression.

What gay man hasn’t fantasized about hot sex with those repressed Mormon missionaries in their white shirts and conservative ties? But there’s more to Mormon fantasy sex than curious young “elders.” What about temple workers and bishops and Home Teachers and, yes, even the Three Nephites?

It’s 1981, and two Mormon missionaries randomly assigned to work together as “companions” in Napoli find themselves in trouble. They’re falling in love, but the Church forbids gay relationships. Will they be crushed by dedication to their beliefs, or will love provide a way for them to escape?

Global Warming. Climate Change. Climate Crisis. Climate Emergency. Whatever label we use, we are facing one of the greatest challenges to the survival of life as we know it. To successfully stabilize our climate, we must simultaneously address the unmet human needs that keep us distracted.

Two Mormon missionaries knocking on doors in New Orleans come upon a gay couple who help them unleash their repressed sexuality, leading them to begin a clandestine love affair carried out in the back rooms of gay bars and French Quarter bathhouses.

In a world already plagued by the effects of late-stage capitalism—economic inequality, voter suppression, healthcare inequality, racial injustice, and an escalating climate crisis—how do we continue fighting for meaningful progress in the middle of a pandemic? Encouragement and insight from a climate crisis refugee and human rights activist.

We need universal healthcare, tuition-free college, taxpayer-funded childcare and pre-k education, fare-free public transportation, automatic voter registration, nationwide vote-by-mail, and immediate action on climate. We must reduce spending on the military and police, and demand that the ultra-wealthy and corporations pay their fair share.

Mark faces isolation during the COVID pandemic but discovers he can help others address urgent needs. He cuts a glory hole in his door to service mail carriers, delivery drivers, and assorted neighbors without exposing anyone to the virus. It’s not traditional volunteer work, but Mark wants to pitch in as best he can during the ongoing crisis.

In the midst of a pandemic and political unrest, Derek won’t let his diagnosis of pre-leukemia force him to accept his fate any earlier than necessary, but he does grant that perhaps it’s time to come up with a “pre-bucket” list.

Todd Tillotson is struggling to move on after his husband is killed during a Black Lives Matter protest in Seattle. In this novel set entirely on public transportation, Todd attempts to safely reconnect with the world.