Catholic Mass

October 28, 2014

Hey Family!!

 

I got your email. We had to change our P-day this week because of baptismal interviews with the Swanepoels.

 

So, this past week has been pretty long. But, it was still great nonetheless. It kicked off really well on Tuesday with Exchanges down in La Rochelle. I was with Elder Nielsen this time, Elder Godfrey was with Elder Tarbet. Elder Nielsen and I headed over to the church to meet someone for a rendez-vous, but we were frudg'd. He didn't show up, so we started walking back to the appartement to have dinner. As we were making our way back, an older gentleman pulled over and motioned for us to come over. So we came over and he unrolled his window...then was just silent. So I asked "Est-ce que vous cherchez quelques choses?" He replied "Vous êtes des Mormons, n'est-ce pas?" We replied in the affirmative, (which I normally don't reply that way. Usually I say that we are from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and that people nicknamed us the Mormons.) He then said "I was in contact with the Mormons 30-40 years ago. Here's my card. I live over in that building over there. Can you come over at 15h00 tomorrow?" So we looked at our schedule and we "squeezed" him in. (haha, kinda like in the Best Two Years.)

 

We went out porting that night and prayed with two different people. It was pretty cool and miraculous. We even gave a Book of Mormon to one of them. Sadly, they weren't interested to learn more though.

 

So then Wednesday, Elder Godfrey and I headed over to that guy's appartement. His name is Christian and he was baptized in Marseilles. He was ordained to a priest. He then went away from the church because of little things that bothered him (calling each other brother and sister and small stuff like that) and because of his work. He was in the French Navy basically since the age of the Dinosaures. He's moved around quite a bit. He saw us walking and decided that he'd try to come a sunday or two. He was a very nice guy and I hope that he comes...he lives a five minutes walk from the church. (Or, because I have read it recently, And it was a five minute walk for a Nephite.)

 

Wednesday night, we received permission from Président Babin to go to a Catholic Masse for a student ward in La Rochelle that we were invited to. The service itself was really confusing and didn't make too much sense to me. The "Father" (the priest) read some parable and "expounded" on it...but didn't really actually expound on it...and then there was one part when a bunch of the students just fell on their knees at the same time...Elder Godfrey and I had NO idea what to do. Ha. It was very interesting. I don't think I'll convert over to Cathotholism. I'll stay in The Church of Jesus Christ. Afterwards, there was a dinner for everyone, and many students insisted we go, so we did. It was really cool to speak with people our age. Real, believing young adults. It was a really neat experience.

 

And then the rest of the week we went our searching for people who'll listen to us. We saw this guy on a bench playing guitar, so we went and listened to him. After he finished his song, he asked us who we are and what we're doing and stuff. We ended up teaching him the Restoration right there. He then let me play a couple songs with his guitar, it was pretty cool. We set up a return rendez-vous with him for this Thursday.

 

Yesterday was quite the stressful day. The Swanepoel's let us know that Bokke would be playing Rugby the sunday after their baptism, which means they wouldn't be able to come to get confirmed (we do all our baptisms in La Rochelle on sundays, so that all the ward members can be there). So we called up the bishop to explain the situation, he then told us that if we got permission from the mission president, we could do it all the same day. So after a 15 minute call with the mission president, we called the bishop letting him know that we received permission to do so. Then we called the Swanepoel's back and let them know that, they then asked if we could do the interview Wednesday instead...so we asked if it was at all possible for them to do it today, and they pushed back the interviews about an hour. It was pretty stressful, but everything with that went really well. :)

 

On another great note, I am now officially legal for my second year in France. I'm legal until the 13 of September in 2015.

 

About Halloween. The French don't really celebrate it. Last Halloween I think I saw 5 kids dressed up. If that. Halloween isn't big at all. Especially those that are part of the Jehovah's Witness. But that religion doesn't celebrate like any holidays. Some French find it rather atrocious, others think it's super weird, others would love to celebrate it, but don't want to alone, and then others don't care and celebrate it themselves.

 

Sorry this week is so short. We don't have too much time. :P

 

I love you all and hope everything is going well! I'm glad that you're having fun showing everyone my "frost-bitten" feet. Here's a quote for you, if you get it "His feet have the black!!" :)

 

-Elder B. Stanton Wilson