The Mormon Candidate - a Novel

by Avraham Azrieli

  Prophet Joseph Smith’s words and revelations were studied by all Mormon men. Part of being a Saint was the practice of our Prophet’s famous revelation about baptizing the dead. His words on this subject, quoted in the Doctrine and Covenants, were recited often. I was awed by seeing these very words scribbled by his own hand on the blank half-page above a chapter beginning in the first edition of the Book of Mormon.

  I presume the doctrine of “baptism for the dead” has ere this reached your ears, and may have raised some inquiries in your minds respecting the same. I cannot in this letter give you all the information you may desire on the subject; but aside from knowledge independent of the Bible, I would say that it was certainly practiced by the ancient churches; and Saint Paul endeavors to prove the doctrine of the resurrection from the same, and says, “Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? Why are they then baptized for the dead?”

  In the margins of the opposite page, beside the printed text, were strange markings in ink, clearly made by hand. I pointed. “What are these?”

  “Reformed Egyptian,” Bishop Morgan said in a voice touched by tremor. “Same as the translated holy texts!”

  I nodded. He was referring to the translation by the Prophet of the Book of Mormon from the ancient gold plates given to him by the Angel Moroni in upstate New York in 1827, and the ancient Egyptian papyri that a traveler had brought in 1835 to Kirtland, Ohio, where the Saints had moved after their exile from New York. Our prophet, Joseph Smith, was also a Seer, capable of translating foreign languages. He translated the papyri, finding them to contain the personal journals of the ancient Hebrew patriarchs Abraham and Moses. Those translations, together with other revelations, became known as the Book of Abraham and the Book of Moses, as part of our gospel in the collective scripture titled Pearl of Great Price.

  “These Egyptian letters,” Bishop Morgan said, “were added by the Prophet’s own hand!”

  Peering at these markings, I trembled.

  “I compared it to the Prophet’s other notations.” The bishop gestured vaguely at the glass-covered shelves of old books. “It’s authentic.”

  After returning the precious volume of the Book of Mormon to the high shelf and closing the glass door, Bishop Morgan shared with me that he had recently experienced a personal revelation: God was concerned that we have neglected to save a special class of souls—the bravest souls of our nation, the men whose courage in battle revealed their souls to be of the highest selflessness and idealism, men who had shown through their valorous sacrifices a great superiority to common men and thereby proved that they had progressed to a higher level of righteousness, almost as high as us, Latter-day Saints, even though they were uninformed of the True Church during their mortal lives on Earth.

  According to Bishop Morgan, his personal revelation had been blessed by the First Presidency of the LDS Church in Utah, after the Quorum of Twelve had discussed and confirmed its authenticity. He decided to call on me to assist in this sacred project.

  The first round of baptizing would be for winners of the US Medal of Honor. He explained that the medal was first created in 1862 by the US Senate and signed into law by President Lincoln during the Civil War for servicemen who “most distinguish themselves by their gallantry and other seamanlike qualities.” In 1917, other medals had been introduced, making the Medal of Honor the highest honor and even more indicative of true battlefield courage in the face of hostile enemy action.

  The instructions I received from Bishop Morgan were simple. Search the computer records at the Department of Veterans Affairs and extract a list of the servicemen who had been awarded the Medal of Honor since 1917, together with their correct birth names, birth dates, and names of immediate relatives.

  Particularly important was the information about their wives. If a hero’s wife was also dead, her soul should be offered salvation through posthumous baptizing as well. That way, they could be sealed in a celestial marriage in the afterlife and spend eternity together as godly parents in perpetual procreation in their own earth-like star. The few living honorees, as well as dead honorees’ wives who were still alive, could not be baptized by proxy. Instead, they would be visited by LDS missionaries and given the opportunity to convert by choice—without being told about the secret baptizing of their dead comrades or husbands, of course, until after they had converted and could be trusted to keep Church secrets from the Gentiles.

  I was to create an electronic file for all the data, save it on a floppy disk, and deliver it to Bishop Morgan personally. I was not to discuss this endeavor with any other person. The list of heroes and their wives would then be divided into several groups and assigned to various Mormon wards for posthumous baptizing ceremonies and temple endowments.

  But while several wards would be called to conduct the posthumous baptizing rituals for all those heroes, our task would be special. As the recipient of this revelation, Bishop Morgan was given the special honor of officiating for the most courageous of all—the servicemen who had been awarded the Medal of Honor more than once. He instructed me to create a separate list of their names in preparation for a special ceremony scheduled for the following week, on Veterans Day, at the Washington DC Temple, where he would personally serve each of those exceptional heroes as a proxy in the baptismal bath.

  I was excited and honored by the opportunity to bring salvation to the most highly decorated American soldiers and give them the opportunity to rise to the Celestial Kingdom of God.

  The Monday after the meeting with Bishop Morgan, I went to work with renewed optimism, finally knowing why God had directed me to this otherwise uninspiring job at the Department of Veterans Affairs.

  The actual process of extraction was not straightforward. By now, all veteran files had been converted into electronic data that could be searched by several parameters. However, medals and citations were not a searchable parameter. I came up with a plan to search through pension records because Medal of Honor recipients received a higher pension, as did their surviving spouses. I separated the list by noting the handful of honorees who were still alive and therefore not eligible for posthumous baptizing, but could be approached by LDS missionaries, as well as the few surviving wives of dead honorees.

  In the privacy of my cubicle, I labored on this tedious process of cross-searching Medal of Honor recipients, dates of death, and wives’ names and status. When a match popped up, I pulled up the personal file on my screen and saved it to the floppy disk. The pension records went back only to the beginning of World War II, but I assumed all previous honorees and their wives were all dead. My regular work wasn’t very demanding, and I kept working on the Medal of Honor list on and off for the rest of the week. But on Thursday, a familiar date appeared in my search: February 28, 1991.

  I knew this date!

  I sat back and shut my eyes against the sudden inferno of memories—the hail of bullets from behind the Arab women, the Red Cross team sprawled on the road in bloodied white coats, my own body perforated and bleeding, the chopper appearing over the school like a guardian angel.

  I attempted to chase off the storm of memories, but failed. I could see the dark-eyed captain giving me a quick salute before he slipped in behind the wheel. I saw the fuel tanker, its rear on fire as it roared away, up the street, far enough to blow up without incinerating us. I imagined the captain burning inside the driver’s cabin and wondered: Had he felt the explosion, or was he knocked unconscious before realizing that it was his time to die? Had he seen his uniform ignite into flames, or had he died not knowing that he had saved our lives? Had the blast blinded him, or had he seen for himself that his sacred Jewish undergarment had failed to protect him?

  Chapter 21

  “What the hell! Ben!” Keera hurried down the stairs and started pulling aside curtains and opening windows. “Are you crazy?”

  The sudden yelling tore Ben off t
he small screen, and he stood up, watching Keera go around the living room and kitchen area until she was done opening all the windows. He was still standing there, disoriented, when she came over to him, tore the cigarette from his hand, and went to the sink where she dropped the burning stub in the drain hole and ran the waste disposal unit long enough to liquefy a whole watermelon.

  “I’m going to kill you!” She waved her hands in the air as if spreading the smoke would help. “How can you do this to me?”

  He shuddered in the sudden cold. “I didn’t mean it, didn’t notice I was—”

  “Didn’t notice lighting up a cigarette? Inside our home? After all your promises?”

  He shook his head.

  She pulled the throw-blanket off the sofa and wrapped herself. “Did you notice buying this Marlboro?”

  “I’ve had it since—”

  “Since you promised to quit?”

  “I did quit.”

  “Okay, Mr. Reporter. Let’s review the facts.”

  “It wasn’t a conscious thing. I was reading and—”

  “A burning cigarette appeared between your fingers?” Keera pantomimed drawing from a joint. “Have you switched to writing fiction?”

  Ben dropped back into the easy chair while she went to the powder room and came out with a can of flowery aerosol, which she started to spray around.

  “It’s going to smell like a bathroom here.”

  “Better than a nightclub.” She looked at her watch. “It’s one thirty in the morning!”

  “I said I’m sorry. I’ve kept what’s left of the last pack in my camera bag since I quit. Never touched it in all those months.”

  She sat next to him. “You really didn’t notice lighting up?”

  “I swear.” He took her hand. “Why would I do it here, knowing how you hate it? I’m not suicidal.”

  “Good point.” She looked at the iPhone in his hand. “Still reading? What’s going on?”

  He sighed. “I’m not sure yet.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Tomorrow. Go to sleep.” He grabbed the Marlboro pack from the coffee table and tossed it in the garbage. “There. It’s over. Promise.”

  They held each other.

  Keera slipped her hands under his shirt.

  He pulled them out and led her to the stairs. “Don’t you have to be in the hospital at some ungodly hour tomorrow morning?”

  She purred, making him laugh.

  Chapter 22

  Z.H. Journal Entry # 9:

  On Thursday, the evening before Veterans Day, I drove to Bishop Morgan’s home and gave him a floppy disk containing the two lists. One list had over a thousand names, but the second list was much shorter, containing the names of the heroes who had won more than one Medal of Honor. He asked if the two lists in total included all the names of Medal of Honor recipients since 1917, and I nodded. He held my hand between his hands and recited a lengthy blessing for my good health and joy in my growing family, as well as success in my government job, my service to the church, and my relationship with God.

  I went home feeling terrible despite the Bishop’s blessings, which I had earned through deceit, born of my need to cover up my even worse sin—failing to do what he had told me to do, which was like disobeying God.

  Our youngest, Maxine, was colicky, the others were suffering a winter cold, and Palmyra was too tired and irate to hear about my agonizing turmoil over the sins of lying and disobedience I had knowingly committed.

  That night, sleep came only after I took an extra pill. But sometime during the night, I awoke to find Palmyra shaking my shoulder. She said that I had been yelling incoherently. Paul and Gilead appeared in our bedroom door in their pajamas, their eyes wide. I apologized, explaining that I must have been dreaming about the war. We calmed them down, gave them each a dose of bubblegum Motrin, and put them back to sleep.

  Having drenched myself with sweat, I took a shower and returned to bed.

  Palmyra was nursing Maxine in the rocking chair. She asked me what was wrong.

  I told her that I had disobeyed the bishop’s instructions and had lied to him about it.

  She was as loving and as understanding as any good Mormon wife would be, but also clear in her desire that I confess to Bishop Morgan, repent, and obtain absolution.

  In the morning, as I was eating breakfast with the children, Palmyra asked when I would be calling Bishop Morgan. My response, that I wasn’t going to confess, shocked her. She pulled me away from the kitchen table and whispered urgently, “You must talk to Bishop Morgan! Disobedience is a terrible sin!” I explained that it would be a bigger sin to betray the Marine captain who had saved my life not once, but twice. Whatever level of afterlife his soul was occupying, I knew he surely would not accept the Mormon Gospel, and therefore his posthumous baptism would be a needless insult to his memory and his soul. I didn’t think God wanted me to do it.

  Palmyra wasn’t convinced. “God wants you to obey Bishop Morgan!” She wiped away tears. “That’s the truth!”

  A couple of hours later, while I was already at the Department of Veterans Affairs, busy on a crossword puzzle at my desk, a hand-delivered envelope arrived from Nibberworth Investment Bank. Inside was the floppy disk I had given to Bishop Morgan the previous night. He had scribbled a note on the disk in his familiar, tidy handwriting:

  Brother Zachariah,

  God sympathizes with your righteous dilemma and good intentions.

  However, your heart knows this: Lies + Disobedience = Sin.

  The list must include ALL Medal of Honor recipients.

  Joseph S. Morgan, IV

  My body started trembling. Exposure as a fallen Saint who had disobeyed and lied to his bishop was an offense that could lead to punishment, or even a trial and excommunication, resulting in loss of my family and all my friends, not to mention my eternal salvation.

  On top of it, I realized the only way for Bishop Morgan to find out was from Palmyra. Her betrayal stunned me. Our marriage had been sealed in the Temple, and like all Mormon wives, her personal salvation depended on serving her husband with complete loyalty and devotion. Only I could bring her into the Celestial Kingdom in the afterlife.

  One of my coworkers heard me groan and came into my cubicle to find me trembling. I told her it was a food allergy and ran off to the bathroom, where I indeed lost my breakfast in one of the stalls.

  Back at my desk, I realized there was no one I could call to share what had just happened. Not only did it involve a secret assignment from the Church, but copying veterans’ personal information and passing it to outsiders was a federal crime. Even my elderly parents, who perhaps could be trusted to keep my secret and offer kind advice, were now living with one of my sisters in Utah and had too much riding on the divine prospects of what would happen at the approaching end of their mortal lives. They would be horrified at my failure and would tell me to repent and obey Bishop Morgan.

  And worst of all, I could not consult with Palmyra. The one person in the world whose loyalty to me had been certain, whose love had been total, and whose support had been unquestioning, was suddenly unavailable. How could my wife disclose to Bishop Morgan what I had shared with her in the confidence of our marriage?

  The answer was simple: My wife felt it was her duty to me. How could she stand by and let me destroy my spiritual future, lose the right to progress to exaltation and eternal godhood? How could she let me destroy her chance of salvation and afterlife glory, which depended on me through our sealing in a celestial marriage? By informing Bishop Morgan, Palmyra was saving me—and herself—from a spiritual catastrophe and eternal damnation.

  Was she wrong?

  I couldn’t answer.

  Was I right to disobey and lie to the Bishop to protect the Marine captain—a dead Gentile!—from posthumous baptism?

  I co
uldn’t answer that either. What did I know about the dark-eyed captain? Not even his name! Perhaps I was wrong about the strength of his Jewish faith, perhaps his soul would delight at the chance of accepting the True Church, achieving salvation, and progressing to the Celestial Kingdom of God?

  Chapter 23

  In Ben’s mind, Zachariah’s talk of a floppy disk triggered a memory. He set down the iPhone and went back to look at the photos stored in the Canon’s memory. There were a few dozen snapshots he had taken of Porter’s meticulous search of the accident site, but the one Ben was looking for had been taken very quickly. The object Porter had found stashed in the back, under the dead victim’s belt, was about the size of a DVD case, thin and square. Ben had managed to snap a photo just as Porter was slipping the object into the pocket of his jacket. By zooming in on it, Ben could see something that resembled a floppy disk.

  Shifting the focus to Porter’s face, his expression was inscrutable. Had he known of this floppy disk? Had he been conducting such a thorough search in order to find it? Or was he just collecting evidence? And if so, why put it in his pocket and not with the victim’s other belongings?

  Ben realized the ramifications of the story. The old floppy disk, which contained the Medal of Honor recipients’ personal information and had Joe Morgan’s handwritten note on it, would prove that the presidential candidate had directed the copying of confidential data from government computers for secret LDS baptizing rituals of dead heroes. If this came out, it would outrage not only veterans and their families, but many other voters.

  The events at the Marine Corps ride now made sense. Zachariah had been in possession of evidence that could derail Joe Morgan’s presidential campaign. The mysterious white Ducati had waited to confront him, or to cause the crash. Inspector Porter, conveniently nearby, had searched the body and removed the incriminating floppy disk.