Christmastime 2012 in
the Mission Field
We had an interesting Christmas Season to say the
least. We have been very busy, but it
seems like the holidays are always like that.
But this year we did not spend as much time shopping as we usually
do. We spent our time doing missionary
work. Go figure!
About a week before Christmas we had a big Christmas
conference for most of our missionaries in Portugal. All of them were there except for the ones in
the Azores and Madeira. So, about 170
missionaries or so in one place. Along
with meetings focused on missionary work and on Christ and Christmas, we had a
big Christmas dinner and party. We spent
a lot of time making fudge and Rice Krispie squares. We helped out with the setting up and
decorating and taking down. We ate a lot
of wonderful food. We enjoyed seeing
missionaries from all over Portugal. We
had the conference/party/dinner in the Lisbon area in one of their Stake
Centers. It is a beautiful stand-alone
chapel and we used all of it. Some
wonderful Relief Society sisters from the area cooked some incredible food and
they spent the entire day there. And,
you could really tell that the missionaries had a great time.
The rest of the days since we have written have been spent
doing our normal missionary work. For
us, that means working with the leaders and members and helping out from time
to time with discussions and baptisms.
We continue to have good growth down here with new members coming in by
the week. We are also seeing an
increased emphasis on retention and reactivation. The difficult thing down here in Portugal and
Spain is that the economy is terrible and we have people leaving the country
for work. Many leave for other European
countries and in Portugal we have a lot of members from Brazil who end up going
back to Brazil. It sometimes makes our
attendance records look like they are flat because even though we are baptizing
quite a few, and retaining more than before, there is still an out-migration.
A couple of interesting notes here: Portugal is the leading baptizing mission in
all of Europe. Over the last 12 months
it has more than double the number of baptisms of the next highest country,
which is Spain. Other countries
throughout Europe are really struggling to find new converts. There is a spirit and a momentum here that is
palpable. Most members in Portugal are
first generation and the gospel is still relatively new. It is exciting to see the growth and the
preparation of branches to become wards, and districts to become stakes, and
soon for the new temple to be built. And
here is an exciting new development:
Right now we have about 180 missionaries. Are you ready? By May we will have over 250
missionaries! A lot of them will be
sister missionaries. Portugal is going to
have some excitement while we are here to experience it. And don’t even ask what the Mission
Presidency is going to be doing over the next few months. We will be having fun, I am sure. J
Now, what were we doing Christmas Eve day and Christmas
day? We thought you would want to
know. If not, you can stop here.
Christmas Eve day was awesome. We spent the day with members and
non-members. The morning was spent with
Brother Kocinba and his two children, Moroni and Nicole. A few weeks before, I was instrumental, along
with President Ruberval, in helping Moroni apply and prepare for a mini-mission
of 3 weeks. He is still 17 years old,
but really wanted to serve and we have openings right now because of the
movement of our missionaries. Anyway, he
got his call. He was so excited you
could not wipe the smile from his face.
When we found out that he did not have a suit, and couldn’t afford one,
we decided that our gift this year would be a suit for a worthy young man. Suits here are very reasonably priced so it
wasn’t a difficult thing to do. We went
to the store with the three Kocinba family members. We bought a new suit for Moroni, a simple
bracelet for Nicole, and we gave Brother Kocinba a photo of us working together
on a service project a few weeks ago.
They were all so grateful. After
we got back home, brother Kocinba called and invited us over for lunch. He didn’t want us to be alone on Christmas! We went into his home and he had cooked a
wonderful Brazilian lunch. We were in a
small room with a round table. There
were five of us, and he only has four chairs.
We had salad and beans and rice and chicken…and Fanta grape! It was wonderful, and truly a gift from
someone who was sacrificing to make sure we were taken care of during
Christmas. That evening we spent at the
home of a family from our branch. The
mom and dad are perpetual non-members who think they are members. They frequently come to church and have been
learning the gospel for about 5 years now.
Their children are baptized. They
seem to love the gospel. We just cannot
quite get them to get married so that they can get baptized! Anyway, another great big meal. We watched a Christmas video, visited, and
then headed home about 1030. Then,
across the hall, we got invited over to spend the “evening”. These are not members, but wonderful
people. They did not want us to be
alone. After explaining why whisky and wine
were not our top preference, they gave us some 7-Up and some freshly squeezed
orange juice. We had two hours to get to
know them, look at photos, and show them some of our family photos. We went home across the hall at 1230 because
they normally party on Christmas Eve until 3 or so in the morning. Most people here open their gifts after
midnight and don’t have the Christmas day gift-giving. We hope we can introduce them a little more
to the gospel. We already gave their
29-year-old daughter, Diana, a copy of the Book of Mormon.
Christmas Day: I need
to be brief here. We went to Lisbon and
had a brunch with the other senior couples.
It was wonderful. When we went
out to our car to leave we found out that it had been broken into. Unfortunately I left my briefcase in the
car. It had my computer, which pretty
much has everything on it from our mission….photos, documents, etc. It had my passport. There was some money in the passport
wallet. It had all of our mission call
information and paperwork. It had all of
my medical information. It had our
dictionary and the “Preach My Gospel” in Portuguese. A few other things as well. The feeling that it left us with is difficult
to describe. Some things are so
difficult to replace…not financially, but emotionally. The best part of our day came in the evening
when we were able to Skype with all our children and grandchildren. After such
a difficult experience, it was so calming and peaceful visiting with them and
seeing the excitement of the grandchildren. It truly helped us re-focus on the
things most valuable in life. It has been a daily healing process since that
day, but we are recovering and moving forward with our missionary work.
Our memories of Christmas 2012 are joyous and sad. We are most grateful for the Savior, for our
family and friends, for the wonderful people of Portugal, and for the joy of
the gospel that can heal us from our wounds.
And, we hope that whoever has our stuff takes the time to read “Pregar
Meu Evangelio”. J
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