Dear Family and Friends,
I was transferred, I´m training, we´re opening a new area, AND we have a special assignment in our new area.
I am serving in Reconquista in the province of Santa Fe. They haven´t had sister missionaries in Santa Fe for almost 10 years. They sent us here, along with a new senior couple, with a special focus on reactivating inactive members and strengthening the branches here. They want us to bring some new energy and excitement and to focus primarily on getting inactive families back to church. The mission president literally said "If baptisms come, they come, but I want you to focus on reactivating. Breathe some life into the branches there!"
This district has really been struggling the last couple years, in fact it was on the verge of being closed entirely--but now they are seeing what we can do with 4 more missionaries and a lot of hard work. My companion and I have an assigned area for proselyting and teaching investigators, but we have permission to visit members of the church in the whole city of Reconquista (both branches) and the rest of the district too (which includes several outlying towns). We have no limits! No boundaries! No phone calls to the president to ask for permission to "leave our area." It´s amazing! I love it.
I love my new assignment. I also love my awesome new companion Hermana Baker--fresh from the Provo MTC. I love escaping the sort of corrupted, over-zealous, number-monster culture I was experiencing in Formosa. I love focusing on rescuing "lost sheep" and strengthening the church, rather than just getting people to baptism. And the cool thing is, at the same time, we find people who are ready to be baptized. In our 5 short days here we started working with a less-active woman whose 15 year old daughter wants to be baptized.
I also just love Santa Fe and our area in general. If I thought my area in Formosa was rural, I was wrong. Our area here has lots of long dirt roads that literally pass through giant fields with hay bales and horses. And it is OH SO BEAUTIFUL to watch the sun setting over those country roads and fields when we are out walking from one appointment to the next. Our apartment is lovely and has all new furniture and has air conditioning and a balcony and the view from our balcony is a big grassy field bordered by a forest.
It is also fun to open an area because every day is a big adventure. We are learning to read maps and take buses. Our first night here it was pouring rain and thunderstorming, and we were completely lost, and the lights went out all over the whole city, and we made our way home by the light of the lightning that streaked across the sky about every 20 seconds.
Several times a day I spontaneously burst into the Newsies song "Santa Fe" because I am just so enchanted by this place and because it fits so well my sentiments -- "dreams come true, yes they do, in Santa Fe." It´s just a shame I´ll only be here for 4 more weeks...
One fun thing is seeing people’s reactions to having sister missionaries again after almost 10 years. The little kids and newer converts have never even seen sister missionaries. And most of the adults and older members are thrilled. Several times we have shown up on people’s doorsteps and when they saw us they exclaimed: "I can´t believe what I am seeing! Sister missionaries in Reconquista!!" and then they warmly welcomed us.
Anyways, that´s about it for this week. I´ll send pictures next week and tell you more about our grand adventures.
Love,
Hna Parker
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