March 17 - Helping a Catholic Padre and Israel's Baptism

Meus Queridos Amigos e Familiares,

What a crazy past week it has been, filled with a once in a lifetime experience and a great baptismal service on Saturday.

You all are probably wondering what the once in a lifetime experience I had was...so I´ll write about it first before my time runs out.

This past Friday just after our lunch appointment with a family of members Elder Carvalho and I began to descend one of the main roads in our area. As we walked down the road, we felt the heat and humidity as the sun was shining down on Elder Carvalho and I. As we approached and began to walk past one of the catholic cathedrals that are in our area, we saw an elderly man crawling on his hands and knees up the stairs on the side of the cathedral When I looked closer I could tell this man looked like one the the catholic padres, that we frequently passed in the road while doing proselyting, and that a red liquid was streaming from the top of his head down his face. I thought to myself that the padre was playing a joke on someone or they were filming a terror movie for the church However, as we looked closer the red liquid that we thought was fake blood was real blood. Within seconds of realizing this Elder Carvalho and I and another woman nearby ran inside the catholic church grounds to rescue and help this man, who had lost his balance, rolled down the stairs and banged his head on the last concrete step. As we helped this 70 year old catolic padre sit down I remembered vaguely of the first aid merit badge I did in boy scouts and I quickly gave my handkercheif to the padre and told him to put it on the cut on is head with a little pressure, as his head was bleeding quite a lot. After we called the paramedics and saw everything was under control we left. The next day we heard that in the mass the night before they announced the padre´s fall and that ``os mórmons´´ helped rescue him. Never in my life did I think we would help rescue a catholic padre in the front of his church.

To end the week, we helped 9 year old , Israel, a  member reference, be baptized and confirmed.

I love you all and can´t wait to see you all in a little over two weeks!!!!!!!!!

Com muito amor,

Elder Jonathan Hokanson