many thanks to ma, rachamay, jmag and sis. patiño for your emails and lisa baird for the christmas card. loved the photos of the ander fam.
today is the first day of translado (transfer) 3. both hna rojas and i will stay in tribuno for another 6 weeks. my 12 weeks of "training" is officially over. basically the only difference is that we have 2 1/2 hrs of study now instead of 4. it will be interesting to see what difference that will make. i am excited to be out in the streets for more time.
it´s been a while since i gave an investigator update. here´s the scoop on people we´re teaching:
helena. taught her three times. older woman that lives across the street from our chapel. is catholic, but disagrees with basically all catholic doctrine and traditions. basically, that means she´s a golden investigator. has a testimony, based on her own personal study, that jesus came to visit the indiginous people in the americas before columbus. is very well versed with the bible. has a framed picture of john wayne in her kitchen. her daughter lives in long beach, ca, and likes to "speak english" with me. is a total crack up. went to church with us this sunday and LOVED it. is praying to know if she should be baptized. smokes A TON. no prob, eh?
natalia/nicolas. unmarried couple with 2 little girls. we´ve been teaching them for a long time. natalia is on the brink of baptism. only hang up is that nicolas has disappeared twice in the last month and blown a ton of money on drugs. natalia is willing to forgive all and marry him, but can´t because of the restraining order she put on him after the first disappearance. legally he can´t be in the house, but they´re back to living together. natalia is great and i hope she can be baptized soon. nicolas wants to change, but addictions are hard to break. their progress is kind of on hold right now.
hilda (mom) and martin (son) and veronica (daughter) and rosio (granddaughter). we started teaching this family because the son was a reference, but i think the mom is the one with the most potential right now. martin is 18 and works all day at a car wash so it´s hard to have lessons with him. the whole family is catholic, though not really the practicing type, but martin is way into all the catholic traditions (virgin, santos, etc). hilda cleans houses and doesn´t have time to read the pamphlets or the book of mormon. plus, reading/comprehension is hard for her, so there´s little motivation. but, she is sincerely looking for something better for her family and understands what we teach and is very very receptive. and she has attended church and the ward christmas party and the weekly RS activity. has a baptismal date for the end of this month but isn´t sure because she hasn´t had a strong feeling that THIS is IT. veronica is 13 and is very nice and receptive, but not sure if she is super into what we´re teaching. you know, it´s just eternal life. whatevs. rosio is 8 and told her grandma (hilda) that she wants to be mormon too. great. we can work with that. this family had the discussions from the missionaries about 7 years ago. hopefully the seeds that were planted before are ripe for harvesting now.
mauro. 18 yr old brother of the bishop. has been experimenting with drugs and his girlfriend is 7 months pregnant. wants to change his life. in our first visit, he asked us about baptism, said he´s been thinking that it´s something that he needs. only problem is that after two lessons, we can´t get a hold of him because he went to live with his girlfriend for a bit.
we are always working with menos activos--their stories are always sad. usually they leave the church because they are offended. it´s never worth it.
there are 5 newly called ward missionaries (sisters) that accompany us. one (florinda) is great--will walk around in her neighborhood, talking to people and passing out pamphlets--doing all the finding work so we can focus on teaching. love it!
the church is true!
hermana magnusson
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