L: baby organ; M: shrine; L: Outside arch at Einsiedeln.










JANUARY 26, 2009 MONDAY

Today was P-day! Hooray for P-day! Last week we weren’t able to find time for our P-day so this one was welcome. Elders P&M came over this morning and worked on their weekly emails. I had to get up early to do what I had to do on the computer because I knew I wouldn’t be able to use it the rest of the day. We made birchermuesli for lunch and then we went to the church to meet Elders E&E to travel to Einsiedeln. It’s near Rapperswil and only an hours drive from here. The day was bright, but kind of foggy, but it was a beautiful drive down and back. Einsiedeln is a Catholic cloister/cathedral that is immense inside and very elaborate. You’ll see photos on our blog. I visited there on my first mission; everything looks that exactly the same today as it did then. The art work and craftsmanship is amazing and we’re sure it was done by men and women who loved the Lord. We just wished they had the whole gospel and not just parts. When you enter the cathedral you walk into the big immense worship hall. The ceiling and upper walls are covered with artwork, figurines, I don’t have the words to describe it. Down each side were gated shrines I presume for different saints. We went to other parts that I hadn’t been to before. There was a musical instrument collection in one room and in another a long table where it appeared those who stay here take their meals. We weren’t sure if we should have been in that room or not. We took some photos of a couple of interesting pictures, but the reflections of the windows ruined them; one looked like Christ and the twelve apostles at the last supper and the other was of the birth of Christ. We took a photo of the long hallway with doors going off both sides. These must be the rooms of the priests or nuns in training or whoever. All of them were locked. We went outside again and walked into the interior of the compound and around and then went back out, took some more photos of the outside front, visited a couple of tourist trap shops and then came home.

We arrived home just in time to pick up a little food from Elders E&E apartment and then we went back to ours and put together a slap-dash meal. We only had an hour before we were supposed to meet our FHE group at the church to ride over to the hospital to visit Ilene Russo. She is also a member of the FHE group and she’s going to have an operation tomorrow. The meal consisted of hamburger patties, Ravioli, hashbrowns, meat cheese, regular cheese (as regular as it gets over here), bread, catsup, apple slices and something to drink. We left Elders P&M here to clean up a little because we ran out of time. We didn’t expect them to dump the left over ravioli and the apple slices in the garbage. We’ll have to teach those Elders we paid for every particle of food and we expect not to just throw stuff away just because it wasn’t eaten. We do have containers and a fridge to put stuff in for later.

Diana came up with the idea of making a bouquet of little stuffed airplanes for Ilene because she hates to give flowers that die after a few days. We bought the stuffed airplanes five for a dollar, put sticks into them, put them in a clear glass vase and put blue glass beads the size of marbles in to hold the airplanes up. We then wrapped red ribbons around the top of the vase with a bow and attached a computer generated get well card to it. It looked very cute when it was done. We had the home evening in the hospital and also gave Ilene a healing blessing. It was a good opportunity to teach Naeide and Charlotta the ordinance of blessings for the sick as well as demonstrate it. We are all going to fast for her until after her operation tomorrow about 3:00. We got home about 8:15 and spent the rest of the evening preparing for tomorrow, studying and writing.

Dale Abersold, one of my dear missionary companions in 1963/1964, wrote that they are a little embarrassed about being invited to dinner by the members so many times and it appears we are not. That is a little bit of a misperception because we have been invited a few times and have enjoyed the association with members. However, my dear wife felt we should be here to support the members and not be supported by them, so she’s turned down a couple of invites. She proposed we invite members to our home for dinner. We’ve done that the last few Sundays and it’s been a good experience. However, Pres. Matern advised us we should accept invitations by members so we can get acquainted with them, gain their confidence and be able to support them by leaving a spiritual thought with them and encouraging them to do member missionary work. So Brother Abersold, you should have a clear conscience and please do enjoy those dinner dates.