Sorella Williams: Teaching Eunice and Adriano

This week was long and quick and I really don't know how else to explain it haha.

Poor Sorella Rowe has gotten even more sick since last week and was a walking nightmare for most of this past week. The fun thing about being a missionary is when your companion is sick in bed you get to.....read your scriptures and study or contemplate life while longingly looking out the window. hahaha. good stuff. Needless to say I've had a lot of me time. But she's starting to get better now which is good because this week we have a goal of teaching 21 lessons. So we are working a lot trying to talk to people on the street and make appointments with investigators or less actives.

We had a pretty cool experience when teaching Eunice the other day. We taught her the gospel and reminded her of why it's so important that we take those steps to baptism so that we may enter into that covenant with our father in heaven because when we do, he pours out even more blessings into our lives including a remission of sins and the constant companionship of the holy ghost. It's always a struggle to keep Nicol, her little toddler, quiet as we try to teach. I was sure to have my ipad there for her to play with this time. Eunice is really the best. She and I get along really really well and my heart goes out to her as she finds herself stuck in life not really knowing what's missing. We try so hard for her to discover the truthfulness of this gospel and I know she would receive a confirmation if we could only get her to church. She said she wants to be baptized but she needs to go to church first and we agree. Her husband Adriano doesn't have interest in our teachings and has never sat in on our lessons before, but when he came home from work I made sure I talked endlessly to him. He really appreciated that we cared about his job and his struggles with the economy right now. I tried to sound as smart as I could because I know nothing about the Italian economy or government. BUT I kept him talking which was the important thing. Right as we started talking to Eunice about the gospel he scurried out of the room despite my attempts to keep him there. Anyway while we were in the middle of our lesson with Eunice, he walked right in and said "You two are educated religious people no? So tell me what the world needs, tell me how to fix the world!" It kind of freaked me out because it came out of nowhere and he said it really loudly. We began to answer his question but he kept saying "no no no no I don't feel what you feel because I need something material, something I can actually DO, I'm sick of hearing about faith or belief because that doesn't mean any REAL change" I told him "we do have something material, something different from any church, we do have proof or evidence of God's love for us, It's the Book of Mormon. You can hold it in your hands and read it and know how it changes lives as you discover the truthfulness of it." He wasn't expecting that answer. He came and sat down and started talking to us about how it's frustrating that his church collects donations from its members and yet he never sees any of it truly helping those in need. We explained to him that we donate tithing as they did in the Bible and that we have seen countless people who are struggling receive aid with our contributions through all the many programs our church has to help others. As I talked to this man my heart hurt because I know how many people in this country are in need of both spiritual and physical help and like him, are frustrated but have never known anything different. We had been talking to them for so long that we nearly missed our bus and that would have meant a sleepover on the park bench because there is LITERALLY no one who could have taken us the hour and a half back to Siena. So we closed our lesson with them and booked it out of there. I was in disbelief at how much of an interest he showed and he said he would sit down with us next time we were there and listen. I'm really excited about that because Adriano has been learning from countless missionaries for years so maybe he is finally at a place where he is open to hearing the gospel.

In other news Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the quorum of the twelve is coming to Italy two Sundays from now and we are SO EXCITED. There is absolutely nothing in comparison to hearing one of God's apostles speak. We have invited almost all of our investigators and hope that they come. It's in Florence which I am also really excited about because it's good for the tiny branch down here to see that there are hundreds of members in the church here they are just in the Florence zone. A good reminder that you aren't alone is always a good thing.

We had some really good lessons set up with people this past week, but we got stood up by many of them:( So I'm sorry I don't have more to report on other investigators). We talk to a lot of people and try to find anyone on buses, streets, trains, etc. I love Italians, they are the best people.

Last night we randomly had a girl call us asking for a book of Mormon! That's a first. We couldn't understand her lightning speed Italian mumbles, but apparently she talked to missionaries while traveling out of Siena and they gave her our number if she wanted to know more. So we are meeting with her Saturday.

We are meeting with the Gori family and the Natale family in two opposite towns both an hour away today! The Gori's are a less active family that we are really trying to get back to church. They have never answered their phone to the missionaries before except last week when we made the appointment with them! We are excited to meet them and see what's up.

We also visited Tina this week and after, while we were waiting at the bus stop, (same one we found Irma at) a woman came and sat by us and we started talking. She is originally from Bolivia too and knows Irma really well! She was so sweet and gave us her contact info. I think that bus stop is magic. We had appointments with Irma but they keep falling through. Irma's gonna Irm I guess. But we are excited to teach them hopefully this week.

I hope all of you have a great week and if you feel down just remember that I am in Italy trying to speak Italian, we can all laugh about that for a good while no? I got us locked out of our apartment and we had to make the long hike of shame in the rain to Sorella Feri's who has the spare key and she basically told me to get myself together haha. Pigeons can sense my fear and I swear they find me in any location, and we get stared down by nuns daily, but on one particular day I was feeling pretty good after a lesson with Daniella in the nunnery she temporarily lives in, and as we got glared out of the place, I couldn't help but take my sweet time enjoying the Tocana view and decided to have myself a little photo shoot while they all gave me death looks from afar. Oh mission life.

Love Sorella Williams