South African Adventure: Motherwell Group

Greetings:

As an additional duty we have been assigned to the township of Motherwell, a township where recent protests occurred because the government bulldozed people’s tin shack homes claiming they were illegally built on government land. As a result several hundreds of displaced people demonstrated against the government, and stopped and burned 3 busses totaling gutting them. It made television news nationally. The LDS group in this township meets on Sundays along with 5 other denominations in a dilapidated primary school. The church has rented three classrooms in which to hold meetings: one for sacrament meeting, gospel doctrine, and Relief society; one for priesthood, and one for primary. All four have broken windows, no electricity, holes in the ceiling, and ripped out electric sockets. There are 40 or so people who attend on Sunday and half of them are non-members. The gathering is called an LDS group, not a branch, as it doesn’t have the priesthood numbers to qualify. But everyone is happy because they have a place to meet and worship on Sundays. The other 5 denominations are neighbors in the building and are of varying protestant faiths and apparently some of the classrooms they utilize have electricity.

Well, I must say yesterday was a very interesting experience, quite unique as a matter of fact. It was our first time to visit this LDS group and a first time for an “invigorating neighborly experience.” Yes folks, if you have ever had to bare your testimony to the clang of electric guitars, the pounding of electric pianos, rhythmic clapping of congregations, and the swell of Black chorus singing – then you know what it is like to be in Africa surrounded by protestants on a Sunday. “Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!” echo the ministers’ voices. “Amen!” echo the congregations and so it is that we project our testimonies as though from a stage that all in our primary school classroom might hear. Our prophets, seers, and revelators have counseled us to listen, ponder, and focus on the gospel, and such counsel could not be more appropriate than on Sundays in our Primary school LDS classroom, especially during a testimony meeting. I like the guitar but not to the wailing twanging of a Sunday protestant meeting. So, in the midst of a Black township we seek to magnify our calling and contribute to the spiritual welfare of those who attend our meetings. Have a good day all.

Aloha,

Elder S.