A Igresia (Church)

The picture here is of me right in front of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints in Beira Mozambique. I took it a couple of days ago. Today I wore my church clothes and went to church. I have been to church in many different places, but this was by far the most humbling version of our church. Surprisingly, I understood a lot of what was said. It was amazing to hear the sacrament being blessed in Portuguese by the men. They were all wearing white shirts and I knew that must have been hard for them to do. White shirts aren't too common around here. The sacrament was great. Bread and water are commodities here. Sacrament was about families and marriage. It's funny to me how just a week ago I was speaking at church on the Light of Christ in my affluent Belmont ward and now I was sitting in a congregation where I could hardly understand the lesson with spiders on the walls! Crazy how life is. After sacrament we took a little break and then came back into the room to have Sunday School which was more like Gospel Doctrine since many people are not baptized yet and are learning the doctrine of the church. One thing I noticed is that people sang hard and were not shy or ashamed to read out loud and participate. I really liked that. After Sunday School we had Relief Society. The lesson was about sharing our riches and our talents. I thought that it was crazy how these women were being taught to share when they really had almost nothing themselves. We sang "As Sisters in Zion" in Portuguese. I will NEVER forget it. Ruthie, I sat there singing "As Sisters in Zion" and I remembered how you had me memorize it. I truly felt like a sister sitting there with all the Mozambican women. They were beautiful carrying their babies on their backs and listening to the lesson. After the lesson, they were given their visiting teaching assignments on a piece of paper (they were handwritten) and many women were not there to receive theirs. It was so humbling to be there and to see how faithful these women are with how little they have. I love church. Primary was beautiful to watch. The children all sat on the floor and sang. I loved it!!