M.C. Counselor

You know the person who gets up to conduct a meeting at church and has to babble about stuff? I'm not sure why they do this--possibly in order to kill time. Personally, I don't need it. Just get to the good stuff--the announcements, the business, the talks, the sacrament . . . skip the commentary. And if I wanted a summary of all the talks, well, I'd consult daltonboy's notes (he has to take them so he doesn't fall asleep).

So we're sitting in sacrament meeting the other day and the counselor gets up and starts thanking all the people for "braving the smoke to get to church," and talking about how it shows an extra commitment that those of us in the chapel have even showed up today. I'm looking around, thinking, "What smoke? There was smoke?"

Apparently there are some huge fires going on right now that I didn't know about on account of I've been out of town. And I don't listen to the news.

So, hey! I am extra committed because I braved the smoke. Which raises the question: would I have bothered to show up to church if I had known about the smoke? Because apparently I would have been entirely justified in staying home. I just would have been labelled a coward, and not an apostate, like I originally thought.

Anyway. There was more. Babbling. But it wasn't interesting enough to think about or repeat. Just more about how I should have felt the Spirit, should feel good about myself, should appreciate so-and-so. I did, and I do, but somehow it detracts from the whole experience to be told to. My opinion.

So later daltonboy says to me, "I think some people have spent a lot of time at the EmCee School of Sacrament Meeting Conducting."

Ah. That explains it. I threw the brochure away with all the military recruitment stuff that comes for the boys.