Re: the Mormon church

Andrew, 


Have you been to the Mormon church where you are? If so, what's it like?


Josh


Well Josh, 


I have been to the Mormon Church. They actually don't call them Mormons here, its always "Latter-Day Saints." They are very well known and have a strong following, I seem to bump into members everywhere we go. I'll include a few pictures here but I should also tell you about district conference. The culture of the Church is interesting. They are very spiritual and very participative. The love to sing and they love to sing loud, so much that you can't even hear the piano, but that isn't a bad thing really because they are poor quality keyboards and the congregation usually sounds pretty good. But they have two major difficulties. The mission president put it very well in his talk. He went through a chain of searching the scriptures diligently and then asked what does it mean to search diligently. Then he asked a fun question, if you lose a 10 cedi (~$7) bill on the way to the market would you send a blind man to go back and look for it? Of course not but that is how well we can search the scriptures if we can't read. Literacy is a big problem for the entire country. Then the second problem. "Having been taught in the language of my fathers..." The Book of Mormon prophets did that so they could read the scriptures. They may have spoke in one language but there was another they needed to be proficient in to study the scriptures. The mission president said this was like Twi, Krobo, Elwe, or anyother tribal language that they may speak at home. They need to learn English so they can learn the scriptures. They have what they call Gospel English classes taught during church on Sunday. Most of the men speak english pretty well, the women struggle and often hold Relief Society in Twi (they're not supposed to). The men have an advantage from serving missions and probably just general work outside the house. All things considered I'm impressed how well they know the Bible. I'm guessing they know the Book of Mormon just as well but since Sunday School is covering Old Testament right now I can only guess. 

Love the Latter-Day Prophet Dress

Only seats left in the back, and we were 10 minutes early

So what else is it like? They have a nice meeting house with a big back yard and a basketball court outside and a parking lot (that rarely has more than one car in it -- our's). There are a few other groups close by. One group meets in a school that is very run down, pretty poor facilities. I would guess they could meet in our building because there is only one branch there but, when I say "close" that's relative to the American I-have-a-car proximity. I suppose its too far to walk so they meet there. We could also just go up the road to another church house that is actually bigger than ours (stage/cultural center) but we don't have to because ours is just a couple minutes away, about 15 walking. 

Overall the Church here is very similar to everywhere else. It is teaching them to give up un-Christlike cultural habits and develop Christlike ones. That difference around the world seems to be in what unsavory qualities they have inherited from their culture. The leaders are typically impressive people and have rolled up their sleeves and are engaged in a long process of training and encouraging to build up the congregation. To something so that when He appears, they shall be like Him. 


Hope that helps. 


Andrew

Choir Practice

What we sang. Look closely its a new version.