Connor's new home, Panguipulli, a picturesque tourist town on a lake.

 Panguipulli, Chile

 

Happy Father`s Day and Happy Birthday, Maia, and congratulations on graduating high school!

Ha ha ha! The photo of you two (Mom and Dad) at the bike race is funny. You look like you`re from different worlds.

Lots of stuff to say and I have less time than usual to say it.

¡CAMBIOS! I`m leaving Puerto Varas, and Elder Dennis is to. They took out the elders so the hermanas are now in charge of the whole ward. The members are all pretty bummed that they`re losing missionaries. A lot of them are taking it as a sort of punishment, but there are fewer missionaries entering the mission than leaving, so they needed to close some sectors. The hermanas will have a whole lot more work to do, and they`ll get to teach a lot more.

Puerto Varas has been tough in that we didn`t teach many investigators, and not one ended up coming to church. We showed up to a lot of appointments just to find empty houses and several addresses that don`t exist. The members are strong in testimony, but everyone in southern Chile works really long hours and we`ve found it difficult to work with them (which was our goal for the transfer). Even our lider misional (ward mission leader) only had correlación (I have no idea what that`s called in English) a few times, when it should be weekly. I hope that the hermanas get to teach more, now that the size of their sector has doubled. Missionary work has changed in every part of the world because the world is more wicked and there are a lot more distractions. It CANNOT work without good member/missionary coordination.

Oh! I was going to say where I`m going. I`m going to a place called Paguipulli (I think that`s how it`s spelled). People tell me it`s a pretty lake town like Puerto Varas. They say it`s very beautiful and very tranquillo (which is kinda like calm, relaxed, or tranquil).

Mundial started this week! We got permission to watch the first 3 games of Chile because it´s more productive inviting investigators to watch the game with us than to try teaching people who want to watch fútbol (soccer). Chile won against Australia 3-1. YAY! During a fun game we had a fun discussion with some of the Chileans who wanted it to be very clear to us that America does not mean the United States. America is North, South, and Central America. The United States is just the United States. It bugs the rest of America that we call ourselves Americans  instead of United Statesians. (In spanish, the word for someone from the United States is estadounidence, which would translate to something like Unitedstatesian). Just interesting.

I told a little gnome looking man he was a hypocrite the other day. I never thought I`d do that to someone in the street, but I realized that some people just can`t understand unless their bubble gets burst. He specifically told us that everyone should be a certain way, and then told us exactly why he wasn`t doing those things. I understand better why Christ was sometimes so harsh to the Pharisees and Sadducees. It`s why Abinadi had to be so harsh with the priests of Noah. I think Alma never would have considered that what he was doing was wrong unless he was confronted with a prophet like that. Alma had been living in a culture of wickedness for so long, he was probably numb to it. He needed a wakeup call. The people with real intent will be grateful and will change. Interesting lesson of the week.

I love you all!

-Elder Connor Christopherson