When we first arrived in Joinville, my mission companion's niece, Carla told us that building that we would usually meet in was in the process of being renovated and so our ward was meeting in a different building, which happened to the same one her ward meets in. Yay! So she showed us the building that first Saturday. Well, it took us so long to get ready Sunday morning and then as we were still orienting ourselves to Joinville, it took us such a long time to find that building again, that we missed the first part of our meeting. We decided that we'd just go to Carla's ward instead, since her son, Joao (John), could help our kids feel more at home in Primary. So our first Sunday we went to Carla's ward.
The 2nd Sunday, November 30th, we were in Guaratuba staying at the beach house with my former mission companion and her family and so we went to church there. Even though Guaratuba was a half hour drive from Joinville, the ward there was part of the Joinville Stake.
Guaratuba Building--Us with the De Souza family
Back: Mario, Daniele with Sophia (Dani for short), me, Papai.
Front: Felipe, Henrique, The Boss and Safari Girl
On our 3rd Sunday. December 7th, we made it to the ward that we thought was ours but after we sat through all the meetings and then talked to the bishop we discovered that the Joinville 1st ward was NOT our ward--we were really supposed to be in the Joinville 2nd ward. They had just recently split and the two wards were sent to separate buildings while theirs was being renovated. So now we had to search for our actual ward at a new building.
On our 4th Sunday, December 14th, we figured out online the new building and time that our actual ward, Joinville 2nd Ward was supposed to meet in. It was on a hill, and the steep,narrow driveway up to the chapel made me nervous. But we drove up it in our little stick shift car and made it. It turned out it was Stake Conference and we had only made it to the last hour or so. Papai sat on a chair with one of the kids and then because the place was packed, I sat on the back stage with The Boss most of the time. Now we had found the right building, we just needed to be there at the right time.
On our 5th Sunday, December 21 we were visiting my friend and former mission companion, Daniele Buss de Souza in Curtitiba (about a 2 hour drive north of our city of Joinville) so we didn't make it to our actual ward. Daniele's husband is the bishop of their ward and it was fun to see him in that calling.
On our 6th Sunday, December 28th, we finally made it to the correct building and went at the time listed on line. Unfortunately, it turned out that time was for Sacrament meeting, which at home is usually the first meeting but frequently in Brazil the wards meet so close together in time that it is often the last meeting. And for the ward we were trying to attend, it was the last meeting. There we met this awesome older guy, Antônio Maria Rodrigues Lemos, who invited us over to his house for lunch. He also informed us that we weren't at the Joinville 2nd Ward--that ward had already met and gone home. So we had yet to go to the correct ward. Instead, we had gotten to know yet another ward in our stake. Antonio's grown son, Vitor and his family were in town from Sao Paulo for the holidays and they were excited to meet us because Vitor and his wife lived in Provo for several years while Vitor studied at BYU. Their youngest son was actually born in Provo. So Vitor and his wife Viviane spoke English. We went to Antonio's house for lunch and there I saw this little girl named Bianca that I recognized from Primary from the ward we attended on our 3rd Sunday. It turned out that Antonio's grown daughter Raquel and her husband Elton live in that ward. I remember meeting Elton--I think he was in the bishopic and Raquel said she tried to ask me my name and all I did was smile and turn away. How embarrassing! I even remembered the incident. The hallway was loud when she asked me and my Portuguese rusty and my kids were pulling at me. I think my brain was too overwhelmed to actually comprehend what she asked. At least we were able to have a good laugh about it. From then on Raquel and I became friends. She talked my ear off in English and we were able to get together a couple of times after that. I'll have to write more about our lunch at their house sometime--This family was absolutely top notch hilarious to hang out with--especially Antonio.His wife, Sheila is from Recife where I served her mission and was a sweetheart. She visited recently and brought home fresh graviola (a mango-sized fruit with green skin and pokey spikes on the outside, and white flesh and black seeds on the inside) and made me some juice. What an angel! That was my favorite juice on my mission! Anyway, I digress. That was our 6th Sunday.
Back Row: Cesear Lemos, Vitor Lemos, Viviane Lemos, Elton Fausto, Antonio Lemos--the father and owner of the house,
Front Row: Papai and The Boss, Me and Safari Girl, Sheila Lemos (full name--Helga Sheila Goncalves Lemos) and Bianca Fausto, Raquel Lemos Fausto and Julho Fausto.
Back Row: Cesear Lemos, Vitor Lemos, Viviane Lemos, Elton Fausto, Antonio Lemos--the father and owner of the house,
Front Row: Papai and The Boss, Me and Safari Girl, Sheila Lemos (full name--Helga Sheila Goncalves Lemos) and Bianca Fausto, Raquel Lemos Fausto and Julho Fausto.
On our 7th Sunday, January 4th, our friends Daniele (Dani for short) and Mario were staying with us for the weekend and we finally made it to the right building at the right time. With our stay in Brazil already half over we finally found the correct ward!!! We joked with everyone that we took a tour of the entire stake first before making it to the right place! I think we literally did! I got to go to Relief Society for the first time (the meeting for women) while Papai took a turn taking the kids to Primary.
Our 8th Sunday, we were back in Curtitiba again visiting Dani and Mario so we went to their ward again. That was really fun because we got to see some of the people we got to know at the Christmas camping activity. It was eventful, too when the little girl in the row in front of us somehow got her entire lower arm solidly wedged in the slot that holds the hymnbooks. It took several men and women, and some oil and water to get that little girl's arm out. All right during a very motivating talk about missionary work! I don't think that little girl will ever put her arm near one of those slots again!
From our 9th Sunday to our 12th (January 18th, 25th, and February 1st and 8th) we managed to stick around town and go to our correct ward. By then the renovations on our actual meetinghouse were done and the church was only two streets over from our apartment. We could have walked if it wasn't so darn hot and if church didn't start at 8:30am!!! I never did get over that fact. If two wards met in a building one ward started at 8:30 and the next one started (with their meetings in the reverse order) at 9am. Really? These party animal Brazilians could get up that early?!?! But I think the schedule had more to do with their culture of eating their main meal of the day at noon. Everyone wants to be home for their main meal of the day--LUNCH!!
Now for the really cool thing about the building that was our actual meetinghouse--it was being renovated because it was the very first LDS church building in all of Brazil. How cool is that?!?! We got to be a little piece of church history! It has a little plaque out in front and everything describing the first congregation that met there. It has been renovated several times and this last renovation was to restore it to how it originally looked. I'm not sure if that means the lay-out or the style or what but it is beautiful now.
Panorama of the building (it's not really curved the way it looks in the photo).
This plaque reads, "First Chapel of the Church in South America--On October 25, 1931 this chapel was dedicated by President Karl Bruno Reinhold Stoof, of the South America Mission, from Buenos Aires. There were 98 people present. At this time the Joinville Branch numbered 46 members baptized since the first missionary visit in 1927."
You can definitely tell that the church is relatively strong in Southern Brazil. I think Joinville (city of 600,000) had two stakes. Every ward we went to had an actual church building (no houses or rented buildings or anything) and they all had air conditioned sacrament rooms! Several of the buildings were two stories high with the sacrament meeting room on the 2nd floor. The building in Guaratuba had recently been renovated to have an elevator up to 2nd floor! Other main meeting rooms in all of the buildings had several ceiling fans each. Many buildings had under-the-building parking (oh, those coveted spaces in this summer heat). All of the buildings had large basketball/soccer courts that were used as additional (much needed) parking. Other than that and some general layout differences, the churchs there had all the same basic stuff you'd expect at a typical LDS church in the United States. They had kitchens, bathrooms, cultural halls, large meeting rooms (Relief Society, Priesthood, Primary), smaller classrooms, bishop's offices, and drinking fountains. I guess another main difference is that they had tile floors rather than carpeted ones and so frequently the sacrament meeting rooms were tucked on one end of the building-or on the 2nd level--so people don't have so much distraction of all those high heels clicking on the tile floors. I think the sacrament rooms may actually have been carpeted now that I think about it. But no where else was. Benches in the sacrament rooms were much more rectangular--tall backed, wider, padded like in the States, with high arm rest on either end. There was more space between them, too. When the boys passed the sacrament they did so with one arm behind their backs and brought the tray to each person individually on every single row. They must have been trained that way because every ward we went to did it the same way. They hardly knew what to do when Papai tried to take the tray from them and pass it down the row--and always with the non-serving arm folded behind their backs.
Safari Girl in front of our newly renovated building--such pretty purple plants!
As for actually attending church in Brazil--church was like coming home to me. Besides being the one place where I could most easily understand all the vocabulary, it was a place where I also got to just sit and listen for several hours and practice understanding the language again without having to actually try and respond in Portuguese (for the most part). It was really good practice.
It felt like home, too, because at church it was easy to see that even though our cultures are different and even though we speak different languages people really are essentially the same. In Guaratuba they had Primary and then Sacrament meeting so we were there for the Primary Program practice and the actual Program and I could see--the kids were just like kids are--they goofed off and were silly, some of them misbehaved, some of them listened really well during the practice. The teachers taught, tried to discipline and help the kids behave, rolled their eyes and got a bit frustrated when things got too out of hand and in the end, when the kids performed they did their best and everyone in the audience loved it and felt uplifted. When we went to Stake Conference parents brought snacks and toys for their kids and shared them with each other when they noticed another person's kid getting restless. People brought notebooks and scriptures and followed along and took notes. Parents of restless kids walked the halls. The differences in language and culture melted away as we saw people interact with each other at church. It was a humbling and unifying feeling.
Even more amazing and testimony building to me, was to see that our church on a whole different continent was the exact same church as at home. I'm not sure why this struck me so deeply this time.
Maybe because when I was a missionary I was the one running around and trying to teach people about the church and how it runs and what it's all about. Whereas this time, I came as a visitor and everything was already in place and running and it was all the same as at home. For me, to see that the church was run exactly the same even in another country partway around the world helped me feel how true this church is--that it truly is the church of Jesus Christ--organized in His way and kept in such order that all the same principles are taught to each of His children all over the whole world. That is no small feat to organize and manage a worldwide membership! It's miraculous, really! It was a testimony to me of it's truthfulness--to see that even though our bishops and leaders are UNPAID clergy, no one was varying from the gospel truths and preaching their own ideas--in any of the various wards we visited. We had the same lessons from the same manuals that we do at home, we learned the same Primary songs and sang the same hymns. We learned the same principles. People bore testimony at testimony meeting and people gave talks each week just as they do at home. We were able to attend the temple in Curtitiba and it too, was run the same way and taught the same principles. This especially hit home for me when we returned to the States and attended our home ward for the first time in three months. The Primary President taught sharing time (a lesson geared toward children) and referred to a story they talked about last week about a man in a pit and someone coming to get him out with a ladder and about how that related to the Savior and his atonement. We had heard that exact same story last week in Primary in Brazil! I don't know of many other churches that maintain so uniformly between their congregations the same teachings and doctrines. I know The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is able to maintain this order because it is run by Jesus Christ himself through a living prophet and living apostles just as it was when Jesus Christ was on earth. Our experience in Brazil really solidified that feeling and certainty in my mind and heart. It was incredible!!
It felt like home, too, because at church it was easy to see that even though our cultures are different and even though we speak different languages people really are essentially the same. In Guaratuba they had Primary and then Sacrament meeting so we were there for the Primary Program practice and the actual Program and I could see--the kids were just like kids are--they goofed off and were silly, some of them misbehaved, some of them listened really well during the practice. The teachers taught, tried to discipline and help the kids behave, rolled their eyes and got a bit frustrated when things got too out of hand and in the end, when the kids performed they did their best and everyone in the audience loved it and felt uplifted. When we went to Stake Conference parents brought snacks and toys for their kids and shared them with each other when they noticed another person's kid getting restless. People brought notebooks and scriptures and followed along and took notes. Parents of restless kids walked the halls. The differences in language and culture melted away as we saw people interact with each other at church. It was a humbling and unifying feeling.
Even more amazing and testimony building to me, was to see that our church on a whole different continent was the exact same church as at home. I'm not sure why this struck me so deeply this time.
Maybe because when I was a missionary I was the one running around and trying to teach people about the church and how it runs and what it's all about. Whereas this time, I came as a visitor and everything was already in place and running and it was all the same as at home. For me, to see that the church was run exactly the same even in another country partway around the world helped me feel how true this church is--that it truly is the church of Jesus Christ--organized in His way and kept in such order that all the same principles are taught to each of His children all over the whole world. That is no small feat to organize and manage a worldwide membership! It's miraculous, really! It was a testimony to me of it's truthfulness--to see that even though our bishops and leaders are UNPAID clergy, no one was varying from the gospel truths and preaching their own ideas--in any of the various wards we visited. We had the same lessons from the same manuals that we do at home, we learned the same Primary songs and sang the same hymns. We learned the same principles. People bore testimony at testimony meeting and people gave talks each week just as they do at home. We were able to attend the temple in Curtitiba and it too, was run the same way and taught the same principles. This especially hit home for me when we returned to the States and attended our home ward for the first time in three months. The Primary President taught sharing time (a lesson geared toward children) and referred to a story they talked about last week about a man in a pit and someone coming to get him out with a ladder and about how that related to the Savior and his atonement. We had heard that exact same story last week in Primary in Brazil! I don't know of many other churches that maintain so uniformly between their congregations the same teachings and doctrines. I know The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is able to maintain this order because it is run by Jesus Christ himself through a living prophet and living apostles just as it was when Jesus Christ was on earth. Our experience in Brazil really solidified that feeling and certainty in my mind and heart. It was incredible!!
