Elder Ballard

Happy pday!  Transfer calls came and went, Sorella DeMann and I will be together for another 6 weeks! I'm pumped, I'm really learning a lot from her and she's a great missionary. Plus we have too much fun :)

I'll start with some exciting mission news.... the island of Malta opened up a Sorelle area!!!!!! So now there are 2 sisters on Malta which is just the coolest ever. And one of them is......Sorella Oehler!!!!!!! Yes, my MTC companion is opening Malta for sorelle. So so so so so cool. The work is growing! Slowly but surely. On the other hand, 2 cagliari sorelle got sent to different parts of the mission so now there are only 2 sorelle in cagliari. Which means..... I am 1 of 6 sisters on the island of Sardinia! Pretty cool :) Other than that and 1 zone leader, no one got transferred off the island. Our zone is the exact same which is awesome, we will all get to know each other and help each other with the work! Sardegna sta fiorendo.

A ward member gave us a referral at the beginning of last transfer. An older lady named Francesca who had been taught before and had come to church in the past but hasn't come or been taught in a while because of different medical problems. Well we have been trying her citofono for 6 weeks and FINALMENTE she answered! No questions asked just told us what floor :) (that never happens) and we got to visit with her for a little! She is a talker mama mia but she does just need someone to talk to. We are hoping to help get her back to church because she loved it and loved the people there!!

Speaking of Francesca....we got a new contact this week named Francesca. She was sitting on a bench in centro and we showed her "Grazie a Lui" she said she wants to learn more when she gets back from Venice at the end of November! You better believe we put it on our calendar. 

We had pranzo with Pietro again this week, gnocchi and pesto-- yum! 

Lunch with Pietro.

I got my Permesso renewal documents sent off......my fingerprinting appointment isn't until March 20th so I am going to get to come back to Sardinia in March! Gotta love the speedy Italian gov.

We had a lesson with Donatella this week! We may have set up that appointment on accident..... I was calling everyone in the phone and she wanted to meet so we set it up! Then Sorella DeMann said, "Donatella? She's our Jehovah's Witness friend" oh mama mia. She is so sweet and she most definitely has the light of Christ, so we were very hopeful going into that lesson. But she brought a companion and it all went downhill. Luckily we were able to share the message of the Restoration and bear testimony of that and they accepted our pamphlet! They were super nice and respectful so I thought it went pretty well considering.

English course.....we are getting new people! Slowly but we are! And our phone rings a lot with people wanting to know more details! It's awesome!! This week we decided to do Mormon Do's and Don'ts for the spiritual thought. We made 2 lists to clear up the stereotypes and to bear testimony of the knowledge we have of eternal families!! I know everyone learned something new that night and people were asking question wanting to know more, it was perfect.

We met with Gift this week but it was really short so we only had time to review the Plan of Salvation, purtroppo :/ But she is remembering a lot! We tried to meet with her on Friday too but we got the bidone (ditch).

We did some casa in casa finding this week. We got let into an apartment building and the door or doorbell of each apartment usually has the last name on it. Well we got to one and the last name was Migliore meaning "best" so we were feeling super good, hoping for the "best". AND got to share the "Grazie a Lui" video with a guy that lived there, probably in his 20s. He invited us in but...rules haha. So we are hoping to go back by and see if he is interested! Maybe with our ward missionary. (before passsing him to the anziani). Speriamo per il migliore. We hope for the best ;)

And we spent some time wandering around the city this week putting up english course POSTERS! They are premade by the mission, definitely not the cutest or best marketing but I guess they get the job done. We put them up in almost every bar and cafe around town! Speriamo for more people in our church for english group this week.

We had the awesome opportunity to meet with Rosalba this week, a less active member who lives out in campagna. We aren't exactly sure why she agreed to meet with us but we were able to share some of our favorite scriptures from the Book of Mormon and talk about its importance. It's really difficult because her testimony is struggling. She told us, "if you went to the catholic church, you would know it's true". Huh. That's definitely a new one!! But we really clicked with her and just kind of got to know her and be her friend :) She was super hesitant about reading the Book of Mormon, but by the time she left, she said I promise I'll read not 5 but 10 minutes every day! Success :) We can't wait to go back and see her. 

Another visit we had this week was with Theresa. She's and older lady from Ireland, speaks perfect english, but has lived here long enough that she thinks in italian now. So the lesson was in Italian. We found her number in our phone and she was down to meet up! We went to her house and got to know her......she has known the missionaries since 1973, is friends with the members, has been to church, and has a 1973 edition of the Book of Mormon in english, well worn and read. Along with several other copies of it! So so cool. We proceeded to teach her the restoration, but she probably knows it better than we do to be honest.... she definitely knows it's a god-given book. She knows. But the only doubt she has is about Joseph Smith. As soon as she overcomes that, this woman is GOLDEN! So hit me up with suggestions/solutions per favore :) We are praying to know exactly how to help her. 

We got to meet with Joy this week too! (She and Gift both came to church yesterday). She showed us how she had downloaded the gospel library app on her TV and was telling us how they watch general conference every night before they go to bed and first thing when they wake up, so sweet :) We decided to ditch our original lesson plans and watch a talk with her, since that was obviously what she wanted to do :)))) We watched President Nelson's "The Book of Mormon: What Would Your Life Be Like Without It" very suiting since he talks about his visit to africa. Joy is so cute and it is awesome to watch her testimony slowly grow as she consistently listens to general conference and the Book of Mormon.

Saturday night, the ward relief society had an awesome activity planned, everyone bring a dish using zucca (pumpkin)! And as a relief society talk about the recipe and then have a ward social type thing after, eat and mingle. So naturally, Sorella DeMann and I remembered to invite some less-active members and potentials, english course, friends from the Caritas, etc. We made pumpkin chocolate cookies and got to the church right on time! No one there except the Eldersquorum president. Who tells us the activity got cancelled last night. Mama miaaaaaaa. So we go to call the people we had invited to tell them not to come (awkward) but our phone is dead. So we walk home to get the charger, walk back to the church to see if anyone had shown up while we charge our phone. Whew it was quite disatrous but good thing we are having a Halloween party this Saturday! We are working to get everything together for that. And this one won't be cancelled the day before menomale. Italians are starting to celebrate Halloween more and more I think, mainly because Americans do it and they want to be like America, ma va be! We are so excited for that!! We made fliers and a sign on our board to go out in giro with, hopefully we will get a decent turnout.

The Sassari branch Relief Society

And now, the reason the activity was cancelled. Apparently because ward conference was the next day and major bishopric changes! We got a new branch president, counselors, new relief society president, new eldersquorum president, new young mens president. So pretty much everything! It's pretty crazy the stake presidency comes over from Rome for it. And Sorella Renga (Velardi) was there, she's the stake relief society president but was in my ward in Caserta and is the absolute cutest/classiest lady ever. (Anziano Velardi's aunt). It was so fun getting to see her! 

with Sorella Renga (Stake Relief Society President)

When we sat down in church yesterday, Fratello Mastino came up to us frantic and says in perfect english: "sisters which one of you is it that plays the organ I can't play today we need someone to play prelude and can you play those hymns....." hahahah we didn't know how to react mainly because we were in shock of his perfect english! But I was so happy to play the "organ" aka a keyboard with an organ setting. It was fun getting to accompany, and I'm hoping I'll be able to do it every week now since Fratello Mastino is now the branch president! Vediamo.

Elder Ballard came to our mission this week! Well, he came to Rome... so all the Rome zones and Napoli zone got to see him, shake hands, all that jazz. The rest of us got the broadcast version lolololol. But it was great to hear from him along with Elder Clayton and Elder DeFeo (Elder DeFeo is an italian member of the 70!). They mainly talked about finding more people and talking to more people. Which we are trying so hard to do! At the end of the conference, President Pickerd referenced a talk by Elder Ballard (october 2002 priesthood session) called "The Greatest Generation of Missionaries". I decided to study it this week and it has to be my new favorite. Elder Ballard is very blunt and straight up but he says this: "Listen to those words: valiant, courage, strength, active, true. We don’t need spiritually weak and semicommitted *missionaries. We don’t need you to just fill a position; we need your whole heart and soul. We need vibrant, thinking, passionate missionaries who know how to listen to and respond to the whisperings of the Holy Spirit. This isn’t a time for spiritual weaklings. We cannot send you on a mission to be reactivated, reformed, or to receive a testimony. We just don’t have time for that. We need you to be filled with “faith, hope, charity and love, with an eye single to the glory of God” (D&C 4:5)." There is so much power in those words, and something I've been trying to work on this week. Working to have those Christ-like attributes. Being all-in. Not lukewarm or semi-committed. Elder Ballard says to "Rise up and measure up". So that's my challenge to each of you this week! Even though you may not be a full-time missionary, God has high expectations for all of us. We all have unimaginable potential. Are we rising up? Are we measuring up? 

I love you all! Buona settimana!!!! XOXOXOXO

Sorella Carley Neuberger
Le Sorelle Missionarie
Corso Giovanni Pascoli 25
Sassari, SS 07100
Italia