Staying in Rome!

(rendering courtesy of http://missionhome.com/?missions=italy-rome-mission)

They are saying officially that the Rome temple 

will be completed in early 2016.

PRAY PRAY PRAY!!

I would DIE to be able to go through it as a missionary!!​

Letter 24~

This week was my companion Sorella Clyde's last in the mission. She's the kind of missionary that takes that as "Let's give it everything we've got" so it was an amazing week, we taught a ton of lessons and worked really hard to use every single minute of our time effectively. And because of that... we saw so many wonderful things happen, more on that later! 

 ...but it's also been hard not to imagine myself just over a year from now, being in her place! Her parents came to pick her up, too, and came to Church on Sunday. Watching her cry and freak out and everything, it was hard not to think about how long a year feels right about now!

BUT don't you worry I am SO PUMPED to jump into this next transfer!! We got transfer calls and our whole district is staying, except for Sorella Clyde of course!! This will be my 4th 6-week transfer here in Rome 1. I have been here since Halloween. I am so so SO happy to stay, everything is going so great here!

MY NEW COMPANION will be Sorella Cano! She is coming here from Rome 3 and I have actually met her a couple times! She is Colombian-Italian, of Colombian ethnicity but grew up here in Italy, so she SPEAKS SPANISH AND ITALIAN PERFECTLY, not so much on the English!!

YEAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH we are just going to tear it up with all the South Americans here in our area! I'm so excited! Maybe we'll take turns on the languages, Spanish one day, Italian the next, English the third? We'll see how that all goes down!

From what I remember she's super spunky and sassy and fun and I can't wait to get her on Thursday! Sorella Clyde leaves today, so til then I will be kickin' it in a trio with the other Rome 1 sorelle, Sorella Jones and Sorella Marsh.

Okay now for all the awesome stuff that happened this week!

Nico and Hossein are still doing great!! At Church this past Sunday Sorella Clyde shared her testimony during sacrament meeting and they both cried!! Hossein made us this Persian feast one evening this week: brown lentils, roasted chicken, crunchy basmati rice and cucumber yogurt. He also brought his dotar to play for us but we had no time, seeing as the dinner took like 2+ hours to make!! So that was kind of stressful, since we have a rule that meal appointments wth investigators can only be at max 1.5 hours long... Heh heh... We told him that a few days ahead of time, but... Ah well!

Nico still knows everything is true, but says he's not ready to be baptized. Dai! Come on! It's frustrating because we KNOW how happy baptism would make him- a new start, a promise to God to follow the example of Jesus Christ and all the blessings that come with that- and he knows too!! But still wants to wait! Like... Why would you want to?? Of course he has to feel ready before he can make that decision, but we know that otherwise- he's been ready for so long!! 

Risa, our filippina investigator, is still a hoot! We've decided that we cannot teach her without a filippino member there, because she just doesn't speak English or Italian well enough to really understand on the level that she needs to. We had a great lesson with Normie and 16-year-old Grebel, a mom and daughter in our ward. We basically just watched them talk in Tagalog this time, and Risa cried when Normie shared her beautiful testimony of the Church. It was so special. I could feel the Spirit, even though I had NO IDEA what she was saying. So grateful to them for being so willing to help! I wish I had been so eager to help the missionaries when I was a 16 year old! 

Federica, the gelateria investigator, is progressing! The last time we went, she's just like "I know that Christ is our Savior, but how are we saved? What do we have to do?" She's so golden! Such a humble person, and she was like the saddest of all to hear that Sorella Clyde was leaving, even though they'd just met like 2 weeks ago!

We started teaching Pino, the Italian husband of the family we started teaching a few weeks ago! He is also super golden, he's read the whole Bible before (NO ONE reads the Bible) so he understands the Book of Mormon really well! We are just so happy to be teaching this wonderful family! The mom, Cecilia, wants this so much for her family. I'm so glad to share the light of the gospel, I know that it will make their family strong, just like mine at home!

We also started teaching Maryluz, a peruviana whose sister is a member of the Church in Siena. She'd actually met with the missionaries a few times before too! She is also super golden, just a really spunky lady with a real desire to know the truth! She says that she just feels really good with our Church, something inside just tells her that what we're saying is true! She even came to church on Sunday!!

So many other miracles, so little time!! Also the USB drive on this computer is broken, so no photos this week! Sorry!

Really excited for this next (and probably final) 6 weeks here in beautiful ROMA!!

Sorella Frandsen
brianne.frandsen@myldsmail.net

Sorelle Missionarie Frandsen

Via Villata, 28

00166 Roma, ITALIA