Readers of this Intergalactic Missionary Newsletter know we periodically change our name to insure we remain on the cutting edge of journalistic excellence. We are pleased to announce that our name will be permanently changed to The Emancipation Proclamation. Students of history will remember that President A. Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 to end the practice of slavery in the United States of America. We have adopted this as the new name of our Intergalactic Missionary Newsletter to reaffirm our opposition to slavery. Accordingly, we are planning to free all our slaves within the next few years. Missionaries are reminded to leave their slaves at home when reporting to the MTC.
The following is offered in honor of Elder Douglas Taylor's recent return from the Paraguay Asunción Mission.
About two years ago or so
We visited like this,
I'd just been called to Paraguay
To be a Mormon "Mish."
I thought my health was good enough
I'd never felt too bad
I'd had a cough or two at times,
But colds were all I had.
You poked at me all rubber-gloved,
Like we'd dated all our lives,
And checked me out for maladies
From throwing up to hives.
At last you said I looked all right
And sent me on my way,
With just a hundred shots or so
To remember you that day.
Well now I'm back from Paraguay
And need your help again,
I'll just hop up on the table here
And let you soon begin.
I ate some foods that weren't too clean
And drank the swampy water.
I lived in hovels filled with flies
And ate what'ere they'd slaughter.
I never ate a vegetable
And fruits, I saw them seldom.
Just rice and beans made up my diet
I either fried or boiled 'em.
I never lacked for company
As every single day,
I knew I had a lot of worms
I felt them squirm and play.
The day I left the mission field
The mission Prez's spouse
Slipped me a pill to kill the worms,
As big as any house.
I swallowed it with all my might
And then it did its wonder
It cleaned the worms from out my gut
Mid mighty peals of thunder.
But Doc, you gotta help me still
'Cause even though they're gone,
The worms have left their tracks in me
And might be back ere long.
So load me up with pills and shots
And give a high colonic
For rather than those worms again
I prefer the plague bubonic.
Even a casual perusal of a mission call will convince anyone that there are indeed parts of the human body that are only fit for Satan's infernal regions. It has long been recognized that there are attitudes and practices that should not be brought into the mission field, as they are incompatible with the spirit and practice of missionary work. It seems to be equally true that there are certain parts of the body that cannot be brought into the mission field.
We aren't talking about that part of the body usually left on the cutting room floor as directed in Genesis 17:23. Nor are we talking about offending hands (Mark 9:43), or feet (Mark 9:47), or even eyeballs (Mark 9:49). No, we are talking about the really heavy hitting offending body parts, which, unless removed with the cruelest and most efficient haste, will disqualify even the eldest son of a General Authority from missionary service. We are talking about wisdom teeth.
Unfortunately, I must confess to an insufficient grounding in the gospel to readily understand what it is about wisdom teeth that is so at odds with Latter-Day Saint eschatology. Nonetheless, I can read a mission call as well as the next chucklehead, and I know they clearly direct newly-called missionaries to have their wisdom teeth jerked out before darkening the doors of the Missionary Training Center.
Now I was an old school missionary from back when missionaries wore hats - before the invention of nametags, backpacks, and big sole Doctor Martin shoes that look like cartoon depictions of footwear, rather than the real thing. In our day, missionaries were most often mistaken for FBI agents, rather than yuppie attendees at a hikers convention. One area however where we were clearly behind the curve in our ability to do the Lord's work was our dental condition. Most of us still were in possession of our wisdom teeth. Could it be that the Gospel we taught was somehow less pure than that taught today?
Several people complained of the sacrilegious discussion of a sacred event in the last issue of this newsletter, where we wrote about how to identify fruitcakes and loonies during baptismal interviews. If we inadvertently offended some of you fruitcakes and loonies out there, we hereby extend our apologies.
In the old version of the hymnbook, the hymn "Praise to the Man" had the words "Illinois shall atone for the blood of that man." This referred to the official complicity of the State of Illinois in the martyrdom of the Prophet Joseph. When the hymnbook was changed several years ago, as a gesture to the people of the State of Illinois, these words were changed to, "Earth shall atone for the blood of that man." Folks in Illinois were happy to hear that the rest of the world would have to atone with them. People in all other parts of the world were upset to hear they were being blamed for something they didn't do.