April 25, 2011

Dear Family,

We had a great week! Happy Easter to all!!

Easter here is kinda funny. So Argentina has lots of European influence (e.g. they use bidets). The Easter here is funny because they are suuuper Catholic, but they have big commercial traditions as well. For example, Easter eggs. I never really noticed much about Easter eggs in the states. Maybe the occasional chocolate bunny, or just lots of chocolate in general. Here however, they have a big custom of Easter eggs, which are big hollow chocolate eggs that have some goodies inside. The week of Easter, on almost every street corner there are people selling them, and they range in size from a grape to a football. Very entertaining. At the same time, there are big Catholic traditions surrounding Easter. One of the big ones down here is that they do lots of reenactments of the torturing and the crucifixion of Christ. Two nights this week we were sitting in the apartment at the end of the night planning for the next day when we heard what sounded like a riot outside. We looked out the window and saw a group of people acting out the scene of the Roman soldiers whipping Christ (with pretty legit costumes and everything) as a parade taking up the entire street with about 100 or so people watching them and following them. They went pretty slowly and stopped for a little bit when the got to each intersection, acted out a little more, and then a car that was following them with a big loudspeaker on top would start reading off some prayers and they continued the acting until the next intersection. I tried getting a video of it, but it was pretty dark, so I only got a few decent pictures. (There were a few egg-salesmen and a man with a popcorn cart who trailed behind too). It was nice to see them giving attention to this important time, but I felt like they just completely missed the boat, focusing on the trial and persecution after Christ had already done so much of what the Atonement is in Gethsemane, and forgetting to show the triumphant resurrected Savior.

Anyway, José is doing great and progressing well. We had lunch this week with him, and at the end of lunch after sharing the scripture we asked them the standard missionary question "Who do you know that we could share the gospel with?" José’s wife is a member since she was a kid, but is now inactive and working on reactivating. She gave us the standard member response. "Oh, elders, we know lots of people, but none of them would be interested in the gospel." José however, butted in and gave an awesome response: "Elders, we know lots of people, but we don’t know if they’re interested *yet*." What a great response! So many times we see our friends as they currently are, and how well their current self would fit in the church. We forget that people can change. That’s actually kinda the purpose, to change. And how do we know if our friends are interested unless we give them a chance? So be like José. Be great missionaries! Your friends are depending on you to bring them the gospel whether they know it or not.

I love you all tons! Happy Easter! Remember what it’s all about, then share it with someone!

-Elder Spencer