Elders listening to Sœur Jameson tell about Elder Holland's visit to Kinshasa, and going to Central African Republic with him to dedicate that country for teaching the gospel. Our resident Okapi is standing guard.
Two elders helping Elder Wheatley negotiate for a piece of rope to keep in the truck. It took a long time..... The man selling it had to measure it by estimate and then the negotiations began.
We celebrated Thanksgiving on Sunday, the 25th - the elders didn't want to miss another day of their work in the same week President and Sœur Jameson came. I forgot to take a picture during the meal - we had two roasted chickens(no turkey available), jello, rolls, mashed potatoes and gravy, fresh pineapple, green beans, and pumpkin and banana cream pie. This is after dinner, when they ALL wanted a nap! Notice the big toe peeking out?
Letter to Family
Tuesday,
November 20, 2012
Today we met
with President and Sister Jameson and the Elders. They had been to the two cities in Cameroon
and were going home after staying with us for one night and meeting with the
Elders for President Jameson to do one-on-one interviews with the Elders and
for he and Sister Jameson to tell us about the visit of Elder Holland of the 12
Apostles for a conference in Kinshasa and also to go to the Central African
Republic to dedicate that country for preaching of the Gospel.
All the
branche Presidents and District/Stake Leaders were invited (the Church paid for
the ones from ouside Kinshasa to travel there) and all the missionaries from
Brazzaville and Kinshasa were invited to attend. However, they couldn’t afford to bring any of
the missionaries (senior and young) from Pointe Noire or Cameroon to attend, so
we have waited patiently to hear about it.
There was also a write up in the Church News and Sister Jameson wrote
about it on their blog. The
visitors/General Authorites, were Elder Holland (Sister Holland was unable to
come), Elder and Sister Clayton of the Presidency of the Seventy, Elder and
Sister Renlund of the Seventy, who are over the Africa Southeast Mission Area,
Elder Soirez, who is one of Elder Renlund’s counselors. President Jameson said there was also the man
over all of Temporal Affairs in Africa and 2 security people who travel with
Elder Holland.
We thought
they were coming to dedicate the land for the Kinshasa Temple, but President
Jameson said they came to do a yearly review.
The Church isn’t ready to dedicate the place for the Temple yet, he
said. The people who attended the
difference conference and training sessions were amazed that so many General
Authorities would come at once to visit them in this part of Africa. Elder Holland took the time in at least 2
sessions (with the missionaries and with the branche and Stake leaders) to
shake hands with every single one of them.
He also attended the first graduation of a new program to show men how
to ‘plumb, level and straight’ construction projects and talked at it and then
had each graduate stand with him and get a picture. This program is designed to help not only
them, but in his talk, Elder Holland said it would help their children and
future generations, to raise out of poverty.
The church has brought in a program manager who has many years of
experience in teaching in this field, and a teacher from France to do the
teaching. The hope is that with this
kind of quality training and certification from LDS Business College, an
American college, companies will hire the men to work for them and they will do
such quality work that the companies will want to keep them and hire more
graduates, etc.
While
President Jameson interviewed the elders, Sister Jameson began telling us about
what it was like to be so closely associated with General Authorities. She and President went to CAR with Elder
Holland and Elder and Sister Clayton to dedicate the land. They hired a small plane to take them there
and stayed one night and while they were there, they had a wonderful experience
attending the dedication, then they met with the members of the church there
(one small branche) and then with local dignitaries, to promote PR, and then
came back. It was a 4 hour flight over
the Congo River because the plane was so small, and in a big plane it would
have taken less than an hour. You can’t fly into that country on a big plane
unless you stay at least 4 days. For the
dedication, Sister Jameson said they used several cars to drive up on a hill
behind the hotel they stayed at. The
hotel was very fancy and was built by Mohamar Gadafy, the Dictator of Libya,
for a summer home, before he was killed in a revolution recently. They think some of his wives may have lived
there for awhile. From the hilltop you could see the Bangui
River, which the town is named after.
Banqui is the capitol. The
Jamesons had visited there not too long ago and with permission from the First
Presidency, had arranged, through a member of the President’s Cabinet, who is a
member of the Church, to meet with the President and do PR for the Church and
tell him about the Church and what we teach and why we want to come into their
country – and read the Article of Faith about supporting your government. They said they were asked by Elder Holland to
join in a circle for the Dedicatory Prayer.
The actual prayer is an ordinance of the Church, according to Elder
Holland. The Jamesons were also present
when the country of Burundi was dedicated and they opened it with 8 hand-picked
Elders and lived there until they were called to be the Mission Presidents of
this mission.
Sister
Jameson said that during the time that they spent with Elder Holland, they
found him to be very down to earth. When
he was conducting the training sessions with the Missionaries and the Leaders,
he walked off the stand and interacted with those attending, which amazed
them. Africans are very much into power
and authority and he was trying to teach the concept that it is important for
Branche Presidents and Bishops to give some of their administrative
responsibilities to their counselors and to get out and visit the inactive, the
widows, those who are struggling in life.
That is a foreign concept to them, because the ‘chief’ is in charge and
he is the one who sits in front and tells other people what to do and when and
how to do it. In fact, it is very
difficult for ‘chiefs’ to be released from their callings, because as the
saying goes, ‘once a chief, always a chief.’
President Jameson has made it a practice to always release his
Assistants to the President and Zone Leaders, before they finish their
missions, so they can experience getting released and how it is not a bad
thing. It has been quite a learning
curve for the African Elders. There is
one place in Africa, I can’t remember where, that the real chief was converted
to the gospel and he brought his tribe with him. A nice chapel was built there and the church
was flourishing. Then after several
years, when it was time to get a new Bishop, when the presiding authority went
to release him, he responded that he was not being released because he was the
chief. He was told that is not how
things in the Church work, and he left the Church and took his congregation
with him, because no one dares to not follow their chief. It appears to be much less like that here, in
the city, but it is also true that the current Branch President was told by the
previous one that, ‘once a Branche President, always a B.P.”…. and he would
speak as long as he cared to during a meeting, when it was time to close the
meeting. That wasn’t too long ago, but
it was before we came. Sister Jameson
said that as they flew to CAR, Elder Holland sat in the front of the plane and
no one sat by him, by design. She said
that he was very quiet and didn’t want anyone to talk to him – he was
meditating and preparing for the dedication.
Even when they got to the place, he continued to be very quiet and set
the atmosphere for the dedication. He
said things in the prayer that were very different than when the prayer was
said for Burundi. He said that there had
been many violations of human rights in that country. He said that the work of the gospel would go
forth and that if the government did anything to prevent the work, the Lord
would replace them. She said it was very
powerful.
(another
subject: when the Jamesons attended the
Dedication of Burundi, they said that in the prayer, Elder Holland said that
there were angels in attendance who had given their lives for the gospel. One of the members, who is now the Branche
President, had a son killed during the genocidein Rwanda between the Hutus and
Tsutsis. The son was 14 and was
attending school one day when the headmaster, who wanted to gain favor with one
of the tribes, locked the doors of the school, lit it on fire, and killed over
150 children. At that time, the Church
pulled their presence out of Burundi because of the danger. The man felt the Church had abandoned them
and he had never been able to forgive and heal from the death of his son. When the Jamesons told him what President
Holland had said, he was able to know that it would be OK, that his son was one
of those present, and that it was time to heal. )
The Jamesons
were able to have Elder Holland into their home for a meal and to go with him
and the other authorities to dinner Saturday night, then spend Monday and
Tuesday with him going to CAR. Elder
Holland asked them to speak at some of the meetings and President Jameson
presided at some of them.
Love,
Mom and Dad/Elder et Soeur Wheatley
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