FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE: ANGELS BECOME RAGE ACROSS COUNTRY

If angels had a public relations agent, it would be Nancy Bray.

Her Cape Girardeau apartment is filled with about 50 angels, both large and small. There are wooden ones, porcelain ones, cloth ones, humorous ones and majestic ones, most of them given to her by friends.

She also has collected books and articles on angels.

Angels have become her own personal research project, although she readily admits she isn't a theological expert.

Bray regularly gives angel talks to church groups.

She has even penned a "help wanted" ad for angels that she uses in her talks.

Across America today, angels are the rage. There are angel boutiques, newsletters and seminars. Angel stories and articles are published and broadcast by the news media. There is even an angel TV show.

A 1993 Time magazine poll found 69 percent of Americans believe in angels and 46 percent believe they have a guardian angel.

At her talks, Bray regularly encounters people who say they have had an encounter with an angel.

"I think we've come into a new period in our society where people are more open about their spirituality," she said.

"We all prefer to think somebody extra is looking after us," said Bray.

Bray, herself, believes she may have had an encounter with an angel.

She was riding in a car driven by a friend of hers late one night on Route K in Cape Girardeau. There were two people walking along the shoulder of the road. Her friend was falling asleep at the wheel.

"I knew something terrible was about to happen," Bray recalled.

But disaster never struck because Bray calmly reached out with her left hand and ever so slightly turned the steering wheel, keeping the car from veering off the roadway. The movement awakened her friend, who resumed control of the car.

Bray wonders what possessed her to react so calmly. Could it have been an angel?

Bray became interested in angels 11 years ago when she volunteered to teach a six-week, summer Sunday school class at First Presbyterian Church.

Back then, angels weren't such celestial celebrities. There were few books on the subject. Most local ministers said little about angels in their sermons.

"We had no idea in the years to come there would be all this interest focused on angels," Bray said.

Although a churchgoer, Bray never paid much attention to angels before she taught the class.

She discovered that angels are a big part of the Christian faith. There are between 350 and 400 references to angels in the Bible.

The popularized view of angels is one of delicate, winged females.

"That is one of the misconceptions that came through literature," she said, pointing out that people tend to think of angels as portrayed in Renaissance paintings.

In the Bible, angels take the appearance of both men and women. They often appear as warrior types.

"They are very fierce and strong and can do supernatural things," Bray said.

"It is not always something calm and comforting."

Angels are messengers, she pointed out. In the Greek and Hebrew languages, angel means messenger.

A former journalism teacher and now director of marketing and communications at Southeast Missouri Hospital, Bray identifies with the role of messenger.

"I am in communications. What is it that the angels are doing? Communications."

Bray isn't auditioning for a role in "It's a Wonderful Life." In fact, in classical theology humans don't become angels.

But for Bray, the study of angels itself can make for a wonderful life.

Do you believe in the existence of angels?

YES 69%

NO 25%

Do you believe you have your own guardian angel?

YES 46%

NO 21%

(TIME MAGAZINE 1993)