Chapter 52 My Midlife Crisis

Chapter 52: My Midlife Crisis

I can´t believe that I have officially been in the mission field for a year. Really, it still hasn´t quite hit yet. This week has really been a time to reflect about the last year and think about how I am going to finish these next six months the best I can. I must say, I think I might reevaluate myself next week since this week was all just a little rough. I was able to talk to Cati twice this week, and I am sure you are dying to know what was said. So, get your tissue box ready.

The phone rang three times and my heart was pounding when I heard the familiar Romanian accent, “Hola?”

“Hi Cati it´s Hermana Hopkins....” and then I was abruptly cut off by a gruff "Get your bible." um oh no..... so I was thinking about how I did not want to bible bash with my favorite investigator in Spain, and she started showing me all these scriptures over the phone....and I was like, "Cati cati. Hold up. How are you? How is the baby?  Hermana Portas told me you were pregnant.” So we talked for a minute, and then I went back to the scriptures and then told her that we believed in them too! They weren´t even anti. It was really sad though...it was like all her confidence was ruined. I invited her to pray and ask God and she replied, “I talk to God every night...but let´s just be honest. I am just a human being. I am nothing... plus I am just a woman.” WHAT?? So I talked to her about her worth that she has being a daughter of God, we both shed some tears and then I went on to question her about her experiences when we taught her about the restoration and about the plan of salvation and especially about the temple. Well, we talked and I asked her about how she felt about the temple that her family could be together forever, and she said it wasn´t in the bible and I said it was and gave her some scriptures....long story short, we ended up talking for an hour... and then she said she had to go after going like crazy about the Book of Mormon. It was fine until I brought up Nephi... I can´t even tell you all she said. Partially because I didn´t understand her broken, angry Romanian Spanish. I left her some scriptures to read in the Bible and Book of Mormon, which she agreed to read and then I decided to testify one more time. She had told me earlier something like, “I can´t deny that the Book of Mormon is true but Joseph Smith isn’t a prophet.” So I told her “Well if the Book of Mormon is true, Joseph Smith is a prophet, and this is the church of Jesus Christ on the earth. It is a blessing that we have the priesthood authority restored and that we have the opportunity to be baptized and sealed....and that is as far as I got out when she freaked out and said that we can´t be the only church that will be saved and hung on me.... she asked me earlier to call her Monday, so I called her this morning to chat and see how she was. She said after she was done talking to me last Tuesday she couldn´t eat and that she just felt nervous all day. She is really sick with the pregnancy and isn´t accepting any help from the members there. She told me not to call back and hung up.....

So, that is the end of the Cati story. I really hope that this is just pregnant hormones and that she will remember the love that she felt once in the church and come back.

Now onto the investigators that live in Vilafranca. This week...well... it was really hard. I think God is just really trying to make me the best missionary I can be or something because good gracious, we could really use a break! We had a few days where every cita cancelled and we walked the streets tirelessly talking and getting rejection after rejection. We even got spit on by an old man! (In his defense though, I don´t know if he really meant to. He had no teeth haha) However, I know that after looking back through every day we really saw the Lord´s hand in a least one way. There was always at least one person at the end of the day that was ready to listen...next week, or at least one person that was home that would let us in. Actually we taught Yerka, our lovely Dominican that wants to be baptized but has to work every Sunday. We taught her the restoration and she accepted it without doubt. Maybe with work schedule right now isn´t her time, but we´ll keep teaching her and helping her develop her own testimony. We also are still visiting our cute African, Alberta. She was planning on getting baptized this next week, but her doctors told her with her pregnancy that they would prefer her to wait until next month. So, her baptism date is set for April 19. Who knew pregnancies would be such an obstacle in the missionary work. Haha At this point I bet you are thinking that we aren´t teaching any Spaniards, but don´t worry, we are teaching them too. In fact, Josep is my new Spaniard grandpa. He´s come to three baptisms, and a lot of church meetings, but he refuses to pray! He has doubts that God really answers are prayers and is listening to us since he´s had such a hard life. He lives with his 11 year old daughter (everyone mistakes her for his grandchild) and he is the funniest Catalan man I think I have ever met. He is one of the “radical” Catalans that wants Catalunya to be their own country... so he always has some funny comment. The comment that made me laugh this week is we were teaching them and the daughter had the TV on, and he asked her to turn it off. She, very sassily, replied, “ I can listen and watch TV.. Our teacher in school told us that women have a gift at multi-tasking.” He dryly replied, “Tell your teacher she is a feminist and turn off the TV!” hahaha That about sums up Josep. He is really going through a hard time, and I hope he will just let the Savior in and heal his wounds right now. Also, we are working with a family here. They are a less active family that within the last 10 years lost one of their daughters. After that, all the family went inactive except the mom. It´s so weird though! They all have really strong testimonies and love to hear what is going on in the church, but they can´t bring themselves to just walk through the doors on Sunday morning. If it´s a ward activity they go, but they won´t all go to church. The daughter is also dating this man from Barcelona. About a couple months ago, she gave him the Book of Mormon to read. He is basically atheist, but said he would read it. We found out last week that he was starting 2 Nephi, so we enthusiastically accepted the honor of teaching him the Restoration. He seemed really interested, and we go to their house every Sunday night to have dinner. They are such a hilarious family. They always feed us real Spanish food, so it´s always a highlight of the week (not only the food, but the lessons as well.) I hope as we begin to teach the boyfriend, that it will rekindle the desires to go to church for the other family members as well. Today being p-day, we really just wanted to relax and unwind from the stressful week that we had, so we decided that us four missionaries in the ward would go hiking up to this castle and play UNO on the castle grounds. And that is exactly what we did! It was slightly disappointing that the castle was being fixed up a little bit, so there was construction stuff everywhere, but you know, how many times can you say that you played UNO underneath a castle and next to a moat? Haha I really do love the work here, and I am excited to work with all the energy of my heart for the next six months. We had a big conference this last Thursday, and the main message was to be “real” missionaries, and not just robots. Love the people, care about those you teach, and remember that we are in the service of the Lord.

Les Quiero,

Hermana Hopkins