"From Sister Sarah Ray
August 10, 2009
Ói.
yet one more week here is Coimbra has flown by. Crazy how time flies when you are having fun...
So...as most of our investigators have gone out of town for ferias we have found a couple more...in the unusual places.
1. Pedro...Pedro is the son of a recent convert and is totally ready to get baptized. The only problem is he has to get out of prison first. Yes, the lessons have been taught in Prison, but they also get weekends off from prison in Portugal, so we teach him at his mom´s house when he has a weekend out.
2. Elisabete: Also a weekend outer...but this time from the psych hospital. SHe was commited for being schitzophrenic (spelling??), turns out she isn´t, but now they won´t let her out because she has no where to live. The problem is she can´t have a place to live unless she can get out. SO, we get to go and teach in the psych hospital which is way out in the middle of the mountains. Quite the experience.
3. Francisca: Her son is also schitzophrenic ( I think they really like that diagnosis in Coimbra...every other person we talk to has it.) She is still being bossed around by her 52 year old son who takes all of her pension, spends it on prostitutes and kicks her out of her own house to live in an apartment she has in Coimbra every couple of weeks. She also wants to be baptized but won´t set a date because she never knows when her son is going to call her back home to do his laundry and cook for him. Personally I think a job would do wonders for him, but we are working on that.
Well, for all my poking fun at our actually pretty entertaining line up, we really have had some great experiences. Since we do not have so many people we have really gotten to concentrate on some, and it has made a difference. My favorite part of a mission is being able to answer someone´s prayer. We stoped by Francisca´s house and when she opened the door and saw us, she asked us how we knew that she needed us at that exact moment. It really makes everything else worth it to see the gospel change peoples lives. I love the miracles that I can see on a daily basis. Thank you all for everything! Have a great week.
Irmã Ray
From Sister Sarah Ray
August 3, 2009
Well, this week was definitely challenging. I never thought that I would hate school breaks so much. Unfortunately the entire city of Coimbra has moved and it pretty much looks like a ghost town. Just means that we get to work even harder, so I guess it is a good thing. We did manage to have some good times anyway though! We actually have a new investigator Laura who is from Canada and only speaks English. I never thought that it would be so hard to teach in English, but our first lesson with her would rough! I kept switching into Português, which I guess is a good thing, but it was a bit confusing for her. The cool thing is that the institute group is being great with her, they are planning an all English night activity, translate everything for her and really have done a great job of making her feel welcome. She is awesome. So we gave her one of the MTC Portuguese books that we had lying around our apartment to help her with Portuguese. We explained that it had a lot about church things in the beginning but also had grammar and vocab in the end. So, she opens it up and the first thing she reads is “will you be baptized” ….it was pretty funny. I still do love COimbra and the church is still true. Love you all and have a great day. I am going to try and attach some ~pictures from the castle!
Irmã Ray"
Here's another picture in this entry of Sarah! It's a bit dark, but an amazing shot!
The Best way to write Sarah is:
1) On the internet go to dearelder.com website.
2) There is a drop down box on the right hand side down just a couple inches. Enter her mission which is Portugal Porto and then click "write a letter" just below where you select the mission.
3) On the next screen enter your return address and Sister Sarah Ray in the address line, add your email in the email box below the envelope.
4) Write your letter in the text box and then hit the "send letter" box under the text box to send it on.
This site does require US $.94 Postage. You can set up an account and it will deduct the postage each time you write.
2) The alternate way for sending anything (i.e. letters, packages, etc) through regular US mail is below. This method requires US $.94 postage for letters.
Sister Sarah Ray
Portugal Porto Mission
Rua de Amalia Luazes
No.23 Sala 1
4200-052 Porto
PORTUGAL
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