"My first encounter with voodoo" "I was scared."

January 10, 2011


This week has been very interesting. Some of it was really good, and some of it didn't turn out so well.

On the 5th we had a really horrible day at first. Elder Rybin was sick with a cold, We had all of our appointments fall through. We had three appointments fall through and all the referrals we stopped by and called didn't answer their phones at all. Luckily one of the appointments we saw later. Her name is Jyna Jean-Fransois. She has been a member of 5 years now. The last time I heard anything from her was the beginning of last transfer when she was in a hospital in Fort Lauderdale and we sent Elder Rybin and Elder Steele to go give her a blessing. We did see Vonnette though. Vonnette has read the whole book of First Nephi and she understands it so well. She has also read the talk the President Monson gave on Charity, which I gave to her before the transfer started. She loved the talk.

Dabinsky got out of the Hospital. Dabinsky is Mona Jean Fransois's son who is 16. She is a recent convert that my MTC teacher Nate Nelson baptized. The day of transfers she called us and told us that her son was in the hospital. I couldn't understand everything she said. Later we found out that he had been stabbed in the heart and that he was bleeding all over the street. Their house is two streets over from the hospital. God really did save his life. They said that if he had been five minutes later to the hospital, he would have died. It is also a miracle that he recovered so quickly. He was stabbed on the 28th of December and he got out on the 8th of January. We visited his three or four times during his recovery in the hospital. Mona wants to move out of that neighborhood after the whole incident. The scary part is that he was stabbed on the street that Mona lives on. He was stabbed a house or so down from where Jyna lives, which is on the same street. Luckily that has not been known to happen very often. Mona is so awesome. She is so nice and she is always asking us to come over and to pray for her. She has so much faith.

I also had an extremely weird experience this week. It was my first encounter with voodoo. I was scared. There is this investigator named Odeline has been visited by the missionaries since May when Elder Bolz and Elder Anderson started visiting with her. All of the family is very cool and likes us a lot. The Mom is just super stubborn. She loves us too, but she isn't interested in the Gospel and she just doesn't pay attention. She sometimes listens, but she is a goof off and she just doesn't care. She doesn't go to church and she isn't even that into religion at all, so we are puzzled as to why she won't let Odeline get baptized. Onide loves us. The other elders found out that she was into voodoo back in Haiti. She used to go to church, but then she got into voodoo and stopped going. Well, we thought that we should focus the lesson on Onide, the mom. We were asking questions to get to know her. We asked the question, "Onide, How is your relationship with God." Then she burst into tears and bent over and put her hands on her face. Elder Rybin and I thought that she might have a hard past and that she was going to go into it and that we finally got her to tell the missionaries. But then she started doing weird stuff. She was stomping her feet and hitting herself, and then she was trying to get away from everyone and she ran into her room. She came out and looked like she was in a complete trance. She was bobbing her shoulders up and down and humming songs. Odeline, Isenada who is her friend and is a recent convert, and the rest of the family said that they were songs that dealt with Voodoo. Onide wasn't even responding when we were talking to her and she would hum, do weird motions, and she would pace slowly around the room. She was leaning up against the wall at one point. She even tried to go outside. It is really hard to explain, but she wasn't pretending. Isenada was friends with this family since she was in Haiti and she said that Onide has done this for years ever since she got into voodoo. Odeline said that she had friends whose parents were into voodoo and had similar things happen. They would lose control and go into fits and hit themselves, cry, scream, and do other weird things. Onide has this happen every year during certain months and it has been a problem that they have dealt with since they have been young. Marie, the youngest, was so scared and was starting to cry. The rest of the family just shrugged it off because they had seen it so much growing up. Elder Rybin and I tried to give her a blessing, but she wouldn't stand still long enough. She sat down on the couch and stayed put for a tiny bit and we started to give the blessing, but then she started freaking out and stood up and tried to get away. We started doing the blessing and followed her and did it while we were walking, but then she got away and ran outside. It was super weird. We left and went to our next appointment. We had a lesson with one of Isenada's friends and she was helping us teach him. We asked her what happened. She said that Onide came around and she asked why we weren't there anymore and she didn't believe them when they said what happened. I don't know why she doesn't. We don't know what to do about the whole Voodoo issue. That isn't the biggest problem. The problem is that she can change, but she isn't very willing right now. We don't know how to help Onide. She has been so difficult and we haven't had success in helping her. We decided to do a morning study where we turned to a part in the book of Mormon and read until we found an answer as to what we should do to help her. Turned to a random part in the Book of Mormon and started to read. I read Alma 59-60, and then I turned to another random part and read Mosiah 27. We received some cool revelation about how we can help her. We decided that we need to bring people over who can help her and be her friend, some of them who have had the Voodoo problem and can help her through it. We also read a scripture about how we can pray with great faith that someone can be brought to knowledge of the truth. We are going to pray that she has an experience that will bring her the gospel and help her realize that she needs to change.

I am learning so much on the mission. I can't even begin to write my experiences down. I will just do my best and let God do the rest. I know that what I am teaching is true and I know that Jesus Christ can help me solve any problem and that as long as we are together, nothing can stop us. It has been very hard, but I am loving it. I just hope that I can make as much change on the mission as I desire and that I can help others come unto Christ.

I have to go now. Bye! I love you!

Love,

Elder Seamons