Hermana Emily Barfuss: We Got Kicked Out of a Funeral!

Pretty Flowers for Mama

Estrella update: Sadly we have not been able to find her, BUT we have been trying and praying like crazy. Apparently she has been traveling with the lady she is living with. Hopefully when school starts she will be home more often. We keep telling her grandma to call us when Estrella is at her house, but she keeps forgetting. Gah. Setting appointments and having members remember is difficult.

So this week was nuts. We got kicked out of a funeral. Don't worry...we do not go funeral hopping looking for people to teach! Hermana Day has an old investigator that she taught for three months who passed away. The investigator stopped taking the lessons, but her brother and his family (the Chavez Family) live in our area, so they invited us to the funeral. Hermana Day and I have visited this investigators kids a few times, so they wanted us at the funeral and they asked us to sing with some other ward members. The problem was that the Chavez family are the only members in their family, so the rest of the family wanted the funeral at a specific catholic church. So Hermana Day and I showed up at the funeral, and it was packed with people all in black. I felt very awkward in my dark blue shirt...anyway we hugged the family, hugged the kids, and started to prepare the song and then came the Pastor. Oh the Lord is testing my patience with this Pastor! He simply said, "You are Mormons, we do not believe the same things. You need to leave." We tried to explain to him that we are not here to proselyte, we are here to support the family. He was not hearing it. He asked if he could talk to us privately. No way we were going to talk to him privately! We did not want to cause a scene, so we told him we would leave. We apologized to the family, and the family felt really bad, but they understood that it would be better if we just left. We left the church and had to cry a little bit. Hermana Day felt really bad because she has known this family for so long and just wanted to help them! I felt really weird. I have been teased for being Mormon, but never kicked out of anywhere! I had to sing Love One Another in my head a few times :) I was pretty mad at this Pastor. Like really mad at the Pastor. But now I just hope he has a change of heart. I hope we can all open our hearts to everyone. Unite in faith. Love one another!

I hit an important milestone in my life this week: I slept talked in Spanish! Yes! I said something about Jose Smith

(a cool Lion)

(a cool fox)

I think I found my greatest weakness on the mission: Las Noticias! The news! Every once and a while we will go to a members home and they will be watching the news and I have to try so hard not to get distracted! A couple days ago, a member was watching what I think was a Republican primary debate and Donald Trump was ranting about something. I just wanted to know what he was saying hahaa. I realized that I know real people. Right now. Who have real problems and they need all my attention right now. Knowing this helps me stay focused!