Saturday, November 7, 1998
Bidding a Missionary Adieu is Nothing Compared to the Challenge Faced in Getting One Back
ROBERT KIRBY (of the Salt Lake Tribune)
My nephew Clayton Eves just received his mission call to South Africa. So much for the
power of prayer. I had $20 riding on him being called to someplace really weird, like Mars or
Chicago.
Even though he is blood, and I am therefore required to be at least slightly biased, Clayton is
your average 19-year-old kid. Meaning, of course, that he is obedient enough to stay out of jail
and nearly bright enough to feed himself.
Believe it or not, these are two prime requisites for serving the Lord. However, it is duly noted
that they are not absolute rules. I once had a companion who couldn't feed himself. But that's OK
because he had a companion who had been in jail.
For the average LDS family, few things are as joyfully stressful as sending off a missionary.
Loading the entire cast of a ward road show into a bus and driving it off a cliff is one, but I was
actually thinking more about mission stuff.
Paying for the mission can be stressful, particularly if family planning was not exactly a
parental priority. For example, Clayton has two brothers on missions already. For what this will
cost them, my sister's family could buy three congressmen.
None of this compares to the real angst involving a missionary. It's much more serious than
that. Sooner or later, no matter what kind of kid you sent out, he or she comes home. Get ready.
For Mormons, a missionary homecoming is sort of a trial run at the Second Coming. You
know that it's supposed to be a joyous occasion, but there is also the chance that it will be
painful. A lot depends on how you have been living, and even more on what you expected to get
for your trouble.
If lucky, you will get the same lovable kid you sent out, but more finely tuned. If not actually
smarter, he or she will be at least more grateful. Nothing makes a guy appreciate his parents like
two years of financial responsibility that approaches actual cannibalism.
Sadly, it all goes downhill from here.
It's entirely possible that your missionary will revert to the old ways five minutes after arriving
home. Some don't even wait that long. Heck, the minute we cleared Uruguayan airspace, I
flushed every necktie I owned down the plane's can.
This sorry state of affairs is known as the slingshot effect. However, if you do not make too
big of a deal about it, chances are that some Mormon princess will come along and turn it into a
temple marriage and a mortgage big enough to give Donald Trump a nosebleed.
Other returned missionaries acclimate more slowly. So slowly, in fact, that some of them never
come all the way home. A good example might be having to choke your kid to get him to quit
speaking Portuguese.
This sort of homecoming is infinitely preferable to saying hello to an Angel Moroni double.
This is the kid who brings the mission rules home with him. Worse, he thinks he is everyone's
senior companion.
``Rise and shine, sleepy heads! It's 5 a.m. Time for scripture study.''
I checked. There is nothing in the LDS standard works that expressly forbids you from taking a
shot at someone like this.
This is not to say that Clayton will be like any of these when he comes home in two years. But
if he is, it's nothing more than we deserve.
Salt Lake Tribune columnist Robert Kirby lives in Springville. The self-described
``OxyMormon'' welcomes mail at P.O. Box 684, Springville, UT 84663, or e-mail at
rkirby@sltrib.com.
Page Modified November 7, 1998