The Week That Was

Well let me start by saying welcome little Benji! I don't know if someone forgot or if no one has put a camera to the poor guy's face yet ,but I didn't get any pictures. But I'm sure that will happen next week, right?!? Congrats to Kim also. I like how mom described your walk as it started to sprinkle and then it started to rain. For a second, I had to decide if she was talking about the weather or a balloon of amniotic fluid that had sprung a leak. I figured it was the latter. But congrats on three boys. Sorry Jalayne, but it seems as if Kim is on the road to stealing your dream of having all boys. Better get crackin...but find the right person first. That would be the best thing to do.

So Dad's report about Mikki made me think of an old football player that just became a free agent. Still good at what she does; being a friend, snoring, shadowing, shedding, drooling, being cute and funny, but just old. Sorry Mikki not all of us can be Brett Favre.

Well this new week started out with exchanges with the zone leaders. So I went up to Napoli and stayed some time there. That city is really dirty, but the half of the city where the zone leaders work is really beautiful. It is like New York around the Central Park area and Time Square but Italianized. I was very surprised. Than I returned back to good ol' Castellammare where we did some finding work. The next few days were spent extending commitments and promising blessings to get our investigators to church. That has been the hardest thing by far here in Castellammare - to get people to church. So Saturday night we had an appointment with a really bright woman and we taught part of the plan of salvation and at the end she prayed. It was wonderful, and she promised that she would come to church the next day. So my companion and I were very happy to hear that news. Then Sunday came...the day of "judgment." The first two hours passed and no one showed up. As Sacrament meeting started, I opted to stand outside of the building cause the entrance of the building is kind of hard to find. Fifteen minutes passed and I went back in for the sacrament. Then as I was heading back out, I saw not one but two investigators that had snuck passed me (probably while I was in the bathroom) and were already in the chapel! But neither of them was Giovanna. Then five minutes later came another. Not Giovanna but the husband of the woman from the Dominican Republic from last week. That was a blessing. She later got up and bore her testimony of how grateful she was that she had found the church again after all this time. But then Giovanna showed up - probably the most spiritual part of the meeting. She was really touched. Instead of us setting up an appointment with her, she set one with us. We are eating dinner at her house tonight. That was really exciting.

Later that night we, along with the Branch Mission Leader and another returned missionary, presented a missionary fireside. Our part was about a talk that Elder Ballard gave a few years ago that I had read recently called "Faith, Family, Facts, and Fruits." It is mostly about how in a world where the church is gaining more attention, as members we need to be ready to give accurate and precise answers to questiong without burying people in information. In this way members can build bridges, create new friendships, and, the ultimate goal, have the opportunityto share the gospel with someone. It was a good fireside.

So it has been a good week. Sunday really was a climax of the week, like they told us in the MTC. To answer mom's question about the mission changing as mission presidents are about to switch. I don't feel a difference other than I am getting kind of anxious to see if I will be in the Milan Mission or the Roma Mission. Transfers are next week and anything could happen. We'll see next Wednesday won't we? Yes, we will. Well that is about it for me. Say hi to Benji for me!

(Clark also included two pictures which I will include in next week's post after I return home from helping out with Benji).

Love,
Anziano Hatch