As a youngster, the Utah native with a direct bloodline to Brigham Young was a quick study of the leadership of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He noted that many were lawyers, including his maternal grandfather, Hugh B. Brown, a member of the church's First Presidency during President David O. McKay's years.

The young Firmage decided studying law would be his way of serving God.

Today, facing retirement after 39 years at the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law, he explains how his political and religious journey - from a sheltered upbringing in Utah County to a wider understanding of law and life - allows him to stroll through his home twirling a Tibetan prayer wheel, take Holy Communion at Salt Lake City's St. Mark Episcopal Church, and enjoy Mass at the Cathedral of the Madeleine, while still a Mormon high priest in good standing.

"It has been a long road but I no longer see strangers as the enemy," Firmage said.

Anyone who knows Firmage knows he has at times struggled in his faith.

As an LDS bishop, Firmage refused his superior's directive to begin excommunication procedures against a young man believed to have engaged in a homosexual act. His superior, a medical doctor, assured him that homosexuality was learned or chosen, and Firmage said he had no knowledge to refute him. Yet, he sensed "deeply and powerfully within" that the doctor was wrong.

"I shouted into the phone, 'you can damn well come down and release me but I will not excommunicate this young man, neither will he ever know of this conversation,' " Firmage recalled.

He was released shortly thereafter.

Firmage acknowledged his outspokenness and reputation for challenging established social, political and ecclesiastical norms have made him friends and foes.

His support over time for abortion rights, the Equal Rights Amendment and allowing women in the priesthood resulted in numerous hate letters and even death threats - and, as close friend Scott Daniels suggests, may have deprived him of a general authority post in the LDS Church.

He has even weathered the end of his 30-year marriage, to Gloria, the mother of their eight children.

"We are now better friends than we were mates," Firmage said.

Recently, sitting in his home stacked with volumes of rare books - some written by his great-great grandfather Brigham Young - Firmage seems accepting if not content with an extraordinary life that has enabled him to transcend societal boundaries.

He has journeyed from Brigham Young University to the University of Chicago Law School to the office of Democratic Vice President Hubert Humphrey in Washington, D.C. He has worked with Martin Luther King Jr. and has a lasting friendship with the Dalai Lama.

In the end, home became the U.'s law school, where Firmage taught constitutional and international law to thousands of students.

Now 70, he struggles with health problems. He has suffered several heart attacks. His spine is held together by titanium rods and screws and he continues to negotiate a range of cancer treatments. Part of his healing therapy, he says, is family, good friends and his two Australian shepherds, Frances and Clare.

Friends and colleagues say Firmage is one of those "rare" individuals.

"He is Utah's John the Baptist," said Salt Lake criminal defense attorney Ron Yengich, a former student. "He's out there crying in the wilderness about things the predominant religions sometimes miss and things people in Utah have missed."

Yengich got to know Firmage better after graduating from law school. The young lawyer and his former professor taught a course together, resulting in a lasting friendship.

Firmage has never put down anyone's religion or faith, Yengich noted. "That's why I have a deep abiding love for him . . . He shows that religion doesn't mean you're blind to everybody except [those] of your own faith."

Many Utahns know Firmage for his unsuccessful bid for Congress in 1978. But it is his work against the proposed MX missile project in 1981 - along with a few others - that brought him local and national media attention. Firmage was instrumental in helping derail Congress' plan to put the MX missile project in Utah's west desert.

The MX fight brought together Firmage and Juab County rancher Cecil Garland in the 1970s. Garland had been speaking against the MX project even though Utah political leaders unanimously supported placing the weapon in Utah.

At that time, MX was seen as one big public works project that would bring a stream of federal dollars and jobs to Utah. But Firmage was "dedicated to defeating that thing," Garland said. Firmage had a key role in getting the LDS Church First Presidency to issue a statement opposing MX. Later, the Reagan administration announced there would be no MX basing in Utah and Nevada.

In 1978, Firmage made a bid for Congress on the Utah Democratic ticket. Former state legislator and judge Scott Daniels, also a former student, was Firmage's campaign manager. That was the year Republicans began making inroads, according to Daniels. But Firmage wasn't the type who told people what they wanted to hear.

"Even though he's one of the blue bloods of the Mormon Church, he said some things that made him unpopular with the church's hierarchy and it cost him," Daniels said. "But he just refused to compromise on things he feels are morally correct."

For example, he spoke against organized religious organizations denying the priesthood to women. Firmage doesn't understand why "God only speaks to women through men."

He was a principal voice calling for black members to be fully embraced by the LDS Church. He supported the Equal Rights Amendment and - while not a proponent of abortion - he didn't favor cutting federal funds for abortions.

Firmage says he learned from women students and colleagues. "I didn't know that many things looked very different through the perception of women," Firmage said.

Dee Rowland, director of the Salt Lake Catholic Diocese's Peace and Justice Commission, has high praise for Firmage's willingness to see things through the eyes of others. "He has a spiritual side to his whole approach to human rights, war and peace," she said.

"I feel honored to know him."

sykes@sltrib.com

Retiring Utah law professor Edwin Firmage speaks out:

* If President Bush wanted an excellent choice to replace outgoing Justice Sandra Day O'Connor - and someone from the reddest state in the union - he would have picked Utah Supreme Court Chief Justice Christine Durham.

* When we outlaw whole groups of people by virtue of sexual practice, we marginalize, banish and excommunicate the very groups we want most to influence.

* Following Sept. 11, 2001, Congress, under unrelenting pressure from President Bush, simply abdicated its constitutional power by delegating the decision for peace and war to a White House hell-bent for war at any cost.