11.4.13

Tell the Nelson family I love them and that I'm praying for Kolter. Not much has happened this week. I have been missing soccer more than anything else. I have dreams about soccer almost every night and it is bugging me. Also, the people in my area are starting to bug me. I showed E' Xavier the first paragraph of your letter because we have been talking about how every child in Uruguay is like that here! These people get free education, can smoke all the weed they want, and get married as a homosexual couple and basically don't have to work to survive. All they have to do is have a child and they don't have to work. They think that with all of these “rights and privileges” they can have an easy, carefree lifestyle! They don't have to work and the government pays for their drug addiction. Marijuana isn't even that cool here anymore because sooooo many people are past the desire to smoke weed and they now want to pay for stronger, more expensive drugs called 'pasta base' (which I believe to be like bath salts or something insane like that). It gives them 7 seconds of a major high, then they need to snort more in order to get high again...afterwards they just lay on the floor and drool for hours. And this is what they think is FUN and choose to do this instead of feed their children or raise them with the government’s money. I seriously am so frustrated with some people who are living this life style. Also, when I tell people that literally, the church can solve EVERY problem that they have, they say...Oh no, the church is stupid and you are lying to people to get them to pay tithing to your church instead of pay for more important things (like weed, pasta base, y direct tv). These are the things I listen to. People tell me, “I hate the bishop! He doesn't care about the people in our ward and he is a liar when he says that he will try to help us! I don't have money to feed my children and he never helps!” And in my mind, as I'm struggling to listen to their excuses due to the blaring television in the background (with direct tv and ALL of the soccer packages), I'm thinking, “yet we are sitting here, you are trying to hide your pack of ciggs, your 5th boyfriend this week is drinking his 3rd beer while watching the Barcelona game instead of working, you asked the bishop last week for money (not food) after you haven’t been paying your tithing since your activity in the church, you never go to church, your oldest son is angry at you because you forgot to pay for his soccer gym membership, your daughter is walking around with the finest, immodest clothing, and your 8 year-old is furious and won't get baptized because she lost the charger to her smart phone” I have never seen this side of the church.  I’m sure this exists everywhere, I just never knew it. Also we were talking to a family. I love the mother of the household because she always goes to church and tries her hardest to find people for us to talk to and basically does everything for us. We were talking to her daughter and she tried to tell us that there isn't a difference between the people who go to church all the time and the people who are non-members. She was justifying that if she follows the commandments or doesn't follow them, there is no difference. She says that she used to do all of those things in the church but stopped years ago and hasn't seen a difference. She says that her family is still fine and that they have everything they need. I love what my companion said... “wow, how merciful God is to you and your family. That's incredible...God must love you so much, and what have you done to thank him for the continuous blessings he has given you?” and I said... “And how grateful are you to your mother who prays for you every night and battles with you to do the right things with your life. If it wasn't for your mother and her sacrifices, I am sure your life would be a lot different.” After weeks like this, I have decided, like my companion, that I couldn't be God. I would want to smite way too many people and I don't have the patience to deal with their lame excuses. 

Luckily, we have a lot of investigators who are progressing and we have baptisms. I don't want to sound like I'm complaining, cause I know I shouldn't be like this with my people here but sometimes I want to just knock some skulls together...dad knows what I mean. Just a little skull bump to knock some sense into them.  Sorry, don't have much more time. I'm doing well and I’ll write you next week.