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This is a picture of my siblings and me outside the chapel of Zaragoza Air Force Base in Spain. The year is 1960. I'm the kid on the far right.

The expression on my face sums up my take on organized worship, particularly the kind that requires a strict dress code. It's an attitude I maintained until, well, right now.

Unfortunately, what you see there is just the first of a long line of uniforms in my life.

Believe it or not, the picture also illustrates an important concession in my mandatory church attire. It's not much of one, but it is a change. Notice I am not wearing a bow tie like my personal lab rat of a little brother on the far left.

Mom made that bow tie. I had a matching one, which I was forced to wear until one Sunday when I clipped it to the collar of a passing dog. It was never seen again.

After that (and a bit of useless corporal punishment), I was forced to wear a regular tie. I also hated that one, but at least a necktie could be useful occasionally.

You could take it off and use it to swat flies off the heads of older parishioners. You could garrote another kid with it. It was even possible to hide a knife inside a long tie.

But what the hell good is a bow tie beyond having a knot of colorful fabric attached to your chin? As fashion statements go, it's right up there with clown shoes.

Note: I'll bet that dog never got over the humiliation. My guess is that he deliberately ran out into traffic.

It wasn't always such open defiance. While a Mormon missionary, I tried to fit in. Since most other missionaries had the Duty to God Boy Scout miniature buffalo skull in the lapels of their suits, I had to improvise.

Because I never got past Second Class in Scouting, I found a Bullwinkle pin substitute. Check it out in my official missionary picture.

I told you all of that to tell you this: Even in organizations where pathological reticence is a hallowed point of doctrine, change happens. Regrettably, it never happens fast enough for some of us.

The LDS Church — of which I remain an out-of-uniform member — recently announced that female employees could wear conservative pantsuits to work.

Go ahead. Cast a furtive look over your shoulder for the Second Coming. The truth is that it's not that big of a change, and it's about right on time.

Women at Brigham Young University won or were blessed with the option of wearing pants to school about 40 years ago.

Forty years is the average time it takes for the church to institute a change to something the rest of the world already considers old-fashioned. It happened with missionaries wearing fedoras, women wearing pioneer dresses, and facial hair on both.

Let's synchronize our calendars, shall we? Won't be long now before bishops can start having mustaches again. Not like mine, of course. Little, tiny Hitler ones at first, then maybe an extra half-inch on the sideburns. Beards? Who knows?

The important thing to remember is that you can be your own change. As long as you can stand the sidelong glances from others, wear whatever you want to church. It's not THAT important.

Unless, of course, you're expecting a paycheck instead of just blessings. Then you better stick with the program.

Robert Kirby can be reached at rkirby@sltrib.com or facebook.com/stillnotpatbagley.