For those of you completely out of the loop, Ruyman and I are Mormons / LDS / Latter-day Saints / that one religion people keep arguing about on the American news.There are something like 11 million members worldwide, and some of those happen to live in the Canaries. A majority of the people on the church records here are not active members. For that reason, the congregation we attend is very small. It’s called a “rama,” or a “branch.”
Our branch has about 80 active member ranging from newborn to near dead. A lot of them are immigrants from South America - particularly Uruguay and Paraguay. A few are from Africa, and fewer still are from the Canaries. Even though this is the congregation Ruyman attended as a boy, there’s only a handful of people that he knows from back then.
We had district conference last Sunday. District conference, by the way, is an opportunity for all the members in a certain geographic area to get together and hear their leaders speak. Because the district incorporates all the islands, physically gathering together isn’t practical. Some of the members would have to travel at least a day and pay exorbitant boat fares to go to a two hour meeting. So instead, they had conference via webcam. The different speakers were on different islands and simply got in front of the camera when it was their turn to speak.
Ruyman and I don’t have callings, or jobs, in the church, yet. Something tells me it will be some time before we’re assigned anything official, though I’ve been asked to play the piano every Sunday since I’ve been here. I don’t mind. It’s something I can do without having to talk.
Because of the language, church is mentally taxing for me. The Spanish is flying fast and thick for three plus hours. Tack on the seemingly mandatory social hour at the end, full of handshakes and kisses, and it gets pretty intense. By Sunday night, all I want is a shower and a few hours of silence.
I think it would be safe to say I’m still adjusting.
No comments:
Post a Comment