Mason's Letter -- April 2, 2011

Familia,

Ok, well apparently you all are upset with me because I don't answer questions well enough...even Blair chopped me up about it. haha but here is a summary of the baptisms that we have had in El Carmen. First we baptized Rosa Benitez and her 2 kids, Kerim and Elias. She is super strong right now and is the 2nd counselor in the Primary presidency, and her 2 boys are always asking when they can leave on their missions. After that, we baptized 2 kids, Suamy and Jessuan Diaz, that had been going to church faithfully for their whole lives but had never been baptized (their parents were members but broke up and left and left the kids with the grandparents). Then we baptized the aunt of Suamy and Jessuan (her name is Fransisca Martinez) who used to be way catholic but wanted to get baptized as well. She also is way solid right now. Then we baptized the brother of Rosa a little bit ago (Rigoberto Mejia). He had some family problems so he moved in with his sister Rosa. He used to be way depressed always, but now he has made a complete change and is way happy. That sums up our 7 baptisms over there.

Right now we really don't have many investigators over there. We had a family, but they decided that they don't want anything. And we have the grand-daughter of a recent convert, but she is struggling to leave behind the world. We will see. Oh, and about the family that we baptized with the secretaries. If you look at the picture that is called "suazo de lujo", in the front row there is Elder Guzman, then Eder, Telsa, Melissa, Daniel, Alejandro, and Elder Rodas. In the back row its me, Eduardo, Dilcia, Ana, Marisol, and Elder Mancia. So here is the relationship breakdown. Ana is the mother of Eduardo. Dilcia is the mother of Eder, Melissa, and Alejandro. and the mother of Telsa, Marisol, and Daniel is the one with cancer that got baptized last week (Maritza).

So this week has been pretty normal. We have just been preparing for changes. We did the changes on Thursday and set a record for the fastest time. We did it all in 6 hours, that's a big improvement. My comp is leaving and is getting sent the an area way way far away that is struggling. It's a tiny branch and the branch president just got released and might get excommunicated for stealing tithing money. So my comp is going there as branch president with one of the secretaries who will be the president when my comp goes home. It will be a big task, but if anyone can do it, it will be him.

The other big news this week is that we bought an air conditioner for the house. It has gotten way way hot here and we haven't slept very well due to the heat, it's suffocating. So we were thinking about buying one and then all of the sudden the ward mission leader for the ZL's showed up to our house with one and told us he would sell it to us for 100 bucks. So yesterday we were putting that in. It's really awesome and we slept delicious last night.

Well that's about it. I don't have much time today because of the conference. But I love you all.

Elder Mason Cardon