Spiritual Day

Real quick I want to tell you about
my week, and then tell you about my day,
which was probably the best day of my mission.
This week I had the opportunity
to go to Clermont Ferrand for an exchange
with an Elder named Elder Bellamy.
Clermont Ferrand is way far away, 2 and
a half hours by train to the next closes
city in our mission. We taught an English
class, and the next day we taught a
lesson to a man named Martin.
It was only his second time meeting
with the missionaries, but after
teaching him about the restoration
I felt inspired to ask him to be
baptized, which does not happen
here in France. Usually we don't
ask people to be baptized, because
of the culture, until after many
rendezvous. But I asked him,
and the spirit was way strong
and he said yes! He was stoked
and he will be baptized on the
22 of this month and I have
confidence that the Clermont Ferrand
elders will do a great job of getting
him ready. Other than that, it was a
pretty standard week. We taught over
10 lessons which was very nice and we
had a great Sunday at church.
I love hearing members testimonies and
I know as we share our testimonies with
others our testimonies grow. So my week
was great and we saw a bunch of great
miracles thanks to the Lord.
OK; today.
Last night my companion and I
took a train to St. Etienne, after
asking the mission president first
of course and stayed the night
there because we were going to be
leaving early this morning.
I hope you remember about the
man named Jean Marie, the Mormon Monk
whom I mentioned last week, well, today
was the catholic holiday for monks and
nuns and he invited us to go with him to
the monastery and go to mass with,
pray with, and eat lunch with the
monks at the monastery! It was the
greatest day of my life.
I feel so spiritually filled.
Here is a little play by play of
what our day was like.
We arrived at 9 o'clock
to the monastery and Jean Marie
gave us a tour of the place.
Different buildings, chapels, and
also the classrooms (the monks
receive a free education
on philosophy and theology
for three hours each day but Sunday).
First off, like I said last week,
there are only 550 of these monks
in the world and they are all over.
But here if France, actually in
Chalon sur Salone (sp?) is the
forming of these monks, so about
100 of these monks are here.
After the tour of the premises,
we went into a preparation room
where we sang hymns with the monks
and nuns. The monks and nuns only
interact twice a year, and this
is one of the two times!
It was such a blessing!
So we sang hymns and lit candles in
symbolism of the Light of Christ.
Then we walked together to the chapel
where we attended an hour and a
half mass, but different than most
catholic masses. Most of it was
kneeling on the floor, bowed,
with your head to the floor in
reverence. It was such a great
experience to view their faith and the
similarities they had to our religion.
Their church was much like ours and the
had no statues, and only prayed to Mary once.
After this great service, we all
went together, well the sisters (nuns)
ate by themselves, but we ate with the
monks. Normally they eat in silence
while someone reads scriptures, but since
it was a holiday the priest rang a bell
halfway through and said all could talk
and enjoy each others company. So
actually 3 African monks played African music
while I got to know a couple of sweet monks.
Next, we went into this little visitors
lobby and hung out with 4 monks who were
about our age, and the gave us juice which
they thought was weird because we don't
drink coffee or tea. We had a
great time and I got a bunch of great
pictures which I will send to you later.
At the end of it our talking though,
all of us, the 4 20-23 year old catholic
monks, Jean Marie, and us four missionaries
went into a chapel, into a special
prayer room, and we went want they
called "50/50" on the prayer. They asked
me to offer a "Mormon" prayer,
which they kept thanking me for,
and then we said the Lord's prayer together.
It was one of the most amazing experiences
of my life. These men were so humble
and so excited to hear what we had to
say and what we believed and did nothing
but listen. They were the most humble,
spiritual men I had ever met.
I am so grateful for this experience.
I know that these men truly love God,
and there is no doubt in my mind that
they will accept the gospel in the next
life and not a doubt in my mind that God
will accept them. I am so grateful for
this opportunity I have to build my faith
each day and to learn from others.
This week will be great. I will be
going on an exchange with the Gerland
district leader tonight until Wednesday
morning, and then Wednesday we have
interviews here in Lyon. Then, this
Friday to Saturday morning, I will be in
Geneva for an exchange with the assistants.
It will be a great week!
I am sorry if I didn't share much
more about my week, but it was
great and I learned so much!
Thank you for giving me this opportunity.

Elder Clayton Henderson Welch