MITT ROMNEY CALLED ON MISSION

By Barley B. Bratt

TAMPA, FL—Just days after being officially named as the Republican Party’s presidential candidate, Mitt Romney has been called to serve in the British Isles mission. According to reports, the call was made on Sunday during sacrament meeting at the Tampa Fourth Ward, where Romney was visiting. 

“You don’t see that kind of thing much these days,” mused Jacob Richards (68), a high priest in the ward. “We knew Romney was coming, what with all the Secret Service crawling around the bathrooms and everything, but when L. Tom Perry showed up, we were really surprised.”

“Elder Perry was talking about using the weak things of the world to spread the gospel,” remembers Brother Richards’ wife, Dorine (65), “and then he paused for a real long time and said that he felt inspired to call some priesthood brothers on missions at that very instant. We all thought that he’d call brother Lyman, since he’s so spiritual and retired—and Brother Dewey and Sister Dewey haven’t really been getting along, so I can see how the Lord might want him in the Sandwich Islands—but Mitt Romney was really a surprise.”

Romney’s staffers have scrambled to control any damage that the call might cause to Mitt’s bid for the presidency. One staffer, who did not want to be named, indicated that Romney himself seemed to be looking at a number of options, including reportedly “asking one of his sons to keep an eye on the country while he goes to serve the Lord.” Another staffer reported that Romney has altered his schedule somewhat and will make campaign stops in key East Coast swing states until he can catch the boat from New York to Liverpool.

Romney’s wife, Ann, though tearful about her husband’s imminent departure for an undetermined length of time, expressed gratitude for her children and grandchildren who can help maintain the family homestead and several vacation condos. Ann confided in one staffer that she wished that Mitt had been called, “like that Brother Hill, a few rows up from us, to the Southern State mission or even the Lamanite mission, and not in a foreign land so far away.”  

A third staffer seemed rather confused by some of the details. That staffer stated that “I think I heard Mitt say that he was going without even a purse or a script, so maybe Stefan Morris (a metrosexual staff speech writer) could help him out.”