By Bill Lumburgh, D.Min.

Hopefully pastors and congregations are vigilant in getting The Parochial Statistics (TPS) reports in the hands of their district offices.  You did get that memo?  This paperwork is urgent and is a mark of the church, or at least of our "walk together." Every five seconds (snap!) someone goes to hell (snap!) because a form was not filed, filled out incorrectly, folded, spindled, or mutilated (snap!).

Don't be Pastor Peter Gibbons!  And make sure you use those new cover sheets, okay?  Yeahhhh.

I think we should also have a new stanza in LSB hymn 517/518 in honor of church bureaucracy. And I think it should include guitar chords and choreography for liturgical dancers. This sounds like an opportunity for a GöttesCöntest!™.  

We can kick off the hymn with a special collection of paper clips and staples (Swingline, of course) for Bureaucracy Sunday.  This is one area in which we Lutherans have been lacking over the last few centuries. The last really good Lutheran tributes to church bureaucracy were the Smalcald Articles and the Treatise.

Oh, and Friday is Hawaiian shirt and jeans day at the Gottesdienst Office.  We're trying to build morale and team spirit.

Coffee break's over, fellas, back on your heads!  Yeahhhhhh.