Mormon in Milan: Baptism!!!, Bridges, and Bikes

Email: April 24, 2013

Part 1:

William from Ghana is a member of la Chiesa di Gesù Cristo dei Santi degli Ultimi Giorni in Udine, Italia!

The baptism was perfect! No problems of any sort! He was a referal from the Rome, Italy mission. He was baptized before and stoped going to church and recognized it is a sin and when he came to Italy about 1.5 yeras ago, he knew he needed to find the true church and go every week to please God. He was elect, not more to say then the man with the best intentions and biggest desires.

To fill up the "font" basically a small swimming pool, we used a hose and attached it to the bathroon sink upstairs and then threw it out the window and back inside through the bottom window. It took a few hours to fill up so we just hard a party in the church from 1 until the baptism at 6. We ordered pizza, made browines(Italians love brownies), taught a lesson in the church and I tried learning the piano. All was great except me trying to learn the piano...

Mircale after the baptism! At about 8:00 after the baptism and everything was cleaned up and we were there and so was just a few members, this lady just walks into the church, the member looks at us with the face of "what are you doing just standing there! I have been in this city my whole life and I know all the membrs and who has been baptized and she isnt one of them" So we said hello and we gave her a tour, well this member took over and was super helpfull and did it all and was a super good friend to her. She is from Africa and has lived in Italy for like 30 years and has a daughter. She attends the catholic church because she doesnt know where else to go and all the churches she has tried are weird she says. She thinks the catholics are crazy and weird that they pray to Mother Mary and loves the idea of how we view Mary and dont pray to her. We invited her to church and sure enough, the next day she arrived and stayed for all three hours! The members just attack her in a good way and they love her. We basically dont do anything, the members do all the work! I love the members here! We set up an apointment to see here this week on friday! She is looking very promising!

Cool thing about it, is she lives close to the church and drives past everyday and the reason why she came in is because she saw a "colored man in a white shirt and a tie" walk out of th church (That man was William) so she turned around to take another look and saw a sign on the church and all she could read was Gesù (Jesus) and she didnt think it was really a churhc (infact the chaple in Udine was a business building that was converted into a church), she then turned around again after she decided that even though she had to go grocery shopping, she could wait and take a bit of time to go see what this place was. If she drove past any sooner or later, she would not have seen William walk out of the church and any later, we would have locked up the church and have gone home for the evening. Miracle!

Part 2:

Today for Pday we just wandering around random things in the city and helped a girl out of a tree that she climbed and got stuck. The first picture (after the baptism pictures) is of us doing casa in a rural part, the more beautiful part of Italy, and the second picture is of Ponte del diavolo (Devils point) a gigantic bridge. The city is so cool, quite small and is where Willaim lives and where Fratello and Sorella Toth live, our brach mission leader. The story behind the bridge is that a bajillin million years ago when they built it, the people of cividale didnt have enough money so the devil helped them and provided the means for it to be built but in return the devil was going to take the life of the first one who crossed. Ended up a dog ran across first and the devil took the dog and was never seen again, and thus all the humans crossed in saftey.

I am hoping I get trasfered out...only because I want to see the rest of Italy and I am sick of the Mestre Zone. I love the brach here though and nezt trasfer will be successful as we have alot of good people and potentials to work with.

Part 3:

Yeah we have many bike experiances...this past week, we were riding to an apoitment and I got sick of carying my umbrella so I slipped it onto my handelbars and about half a second later I was on th ground and my bike was on by back and I hurt and my companion was laughing at me...So the umbrella imediatly got stuck in the spokes and stoppedmy front tire completly and thus I fliped and my bike flipped....it hurt but I have to agree, it was funny. And I am fairly sure the member saw us as it was on his street and he was waiting outside for us....yeah it was great. But I got back at Anz. Tanner when he crashed this afternoon riding to the internet point. He had his two letters in his hand and only riding with one hand and when he crossed the street he wasnt paying too much attention and thus ran strait into the curb and the two Italian girls just laughed at him. He scraped up his arm and leg and I honestly couldnt stop laughing as I was following him and saw it all! It is a misison rule to always wear our helmets and everyone in the city knows us as the two boys who always wear helmets. I have only seen another person with a hemet once before, which doesnt make sence because the streets are crazy! I have crashed I think three maybe four times...and have been hit by a car only once. Good record thus far! haha

Ciao! love you tons and tons!

Anziano Edwards!