I have been thinking all week of the things that I would like to share.  We have been so busy with what we do in the Center of Autosuficiencia.  When we first arrived we did not have a center where we could serve the people of Chile.  For the last four weeks we have been conducting workshops for the young people who need to borrow money from the Perpetual Education fund to get an education.  Even though the cost of and education here in Chile is so much cheaper then it is in the U.S., it is still out of reach for so many of them.  I write this to let those of you who donate to the Perpetual Education Fund, know a little about the kind of individuals who are participating in the PEF.   We have had over the last four weeks conducted four groups of workshops with about 36 young people preparing them to apply for a loan for school from PEF. 

The young people are hoping to study everything from engineering to medicine and are some of the brightest and most amazing individuals I have met.  Every time we meet there are spiritual experiences that are related by the participants and testimonies are strengthened. It is not hard to love them and I have a great desire to see them have success.  They come from some very humble circumstances and situations that are not so humble.  But they all have a need and desire to be able to support a family and serve in the church.  One young woman who is a convert to the church who has two daughters one 17 and the other 7, was abandon by her spouse and left to go it alone.  She met the missionaries and joined the church.  She had a decent job but would never be able to provide for her daughters as she would like to.  She decided that she would go to school and study to become a safety engineer.  She has a very tight schedule and depends on strength from the Lord to help her keep her schedule.  She has one year left of the 3 year degree.  She was not able to save enough money to pay for the last year of study so turned to the PEF for a loan to finish her degree.  She works from 9 to 6 in the evening starts class at 7 and attends class and studies until midnight and returns home by 2 AM only to go back to work at 9.  She asked her priesthood leader for a blessing that she would have the energy and strength to keep up the schedule.  She said as long as she keeps the commandments she has the strength that was promised her to continue each day.  She is only one of many who struggle with different issues that the fund is able to give them hope to leave poverty behind and be self-reliant.  I ask the question to a group of 20 why the were at the workshop and the answer was not to get a better job to have more money but their answer was to be self-reliant.  Riches is not their goal but to have enough so that they can pay for the comforts of home and family and provide their children with missions that they are able to finance and be able to send their own children to college without having to turn to the fund for help.  They also dream of having time to serve in the church and not have to work 10 hrs. per day for 7 days a week just to provide the necessities of life.  I've asked them about nice new houses and fancy cars which have no place in their goals at this time.  One young women said if I have everything else then I might think of a nice new house but I would rather have a good job that allows me time to spend with my family and do my church calling.

Most of the members here work long hours and have little spare time.  Most that I have talked to work from 9 am to 7 or 8 at night, so many of the church meetings during the week don't even start until 8 or 9 pm and go until 11 or midnight.  The missionaries in our mission leave their apartment at 10:00 and are to return by 11:00 pm.  much different then in other areas. So for the youth, time with their parents is a premium for them.  They truly are amazing people.  However, there are many less active members because of the difficulty in providing and the many long hours and day of  work.  Many must work on Sunday at a second job to make it work.  I have met several who would like to be involved in the church but are unable to because of work.  There are many who work in the mines up north and are home only a couple of days a month and are unable to move their families because of the cost.  When you think that the cost of living here is very similar to the U.S. it is very difficult when the average salary is around 300,000 pesos which is about 600.00 dollars. 

We only hope we can make a difference in their lives.  Chris told me the other day she sometimes feels like the man on the beach pitching starfish back in the ocean.  There is so much need and we can only help a few, but we can help a few.  The hope is in the hearts of the Chilean members that the time will come that the church will be self-reliant in Chile and they can contribute to the operations of the church in other lands instead of needing help to operate in Chile.  In a few years I truly believe that will happen. 

We were invited today to speak on Self-reliance to the Chile Santiago East coordinating council.  Elder Norumbuena our area authority Seventy asked me yesterday and I was grateful to be able to communicate to all of the Stake Presidents of our mission and explain what our purpose was and invite them to come and participate in the services we offer.  We are not only a self-reliance center but also a family history center.  We will have specialists who will help people with their family history research and because the temple is in the same block they can come to print their family cards for the temple.  It is exciting to see how it all works together.

We really have not been able to go visit any spectacular places lately so no neat pictures but we do have some great group shots of those we are working with I hope to upload before I post. 

These groups of young people are preparing to make application for PEF Loans.  This workshop helps them make decisions on career path, school and how to succeed in class as well as how to find work when they finish.

These are some of the cream of the crop.  With the opportunities of the PEF they will be able to bring the church into self reliance with time. I am proud of them and have really connected with them and have grown to love them.  But that has always been my weakness.  It is hard for me to see them not have all they work for.

Happy New Year to all of our friends and family.  We welcome 2015 and all of it's challenges and blessings.  It is interesting as we started the Holiday week with Christmas and now New Years that everything came to life for us while everything all around us was shutting down.  A little over a week ago a young lady came into our office and was in a bit of a panic because she needs a loan from the PEF to finish the last year of studies in her degree.  She is not from our mission but from the area of the Center for Republica which is West of us and part of the West Mission.  They are not doing the courses for preparation to receive a PEF loan for another six months. Jan 31 is the deadline for receiving a loan for the next semester, which starts in March, and the courses are mandatory to apply for a loan.  Chris and I had already talked about starting a course starting on the 5th of January running each day next week and then finishing the next 9 classes over the next 9 weeks meeting on Monday mornings.  However, this young sister works Monday - Friday from 9:00 AM to 7:PM and is not able to attend during the week.  So I scheduled to hold a course on Saturdays if she could find three to four more participants. So we gave up our day off for a few weeks to help this young lady.  We now have  6 participants for the Saturday group.  Last Saturday I held the first of 7 week ends in that we are doing two courses per Saturday. Nayaret and two of her friends who are also in need of the courses, but had given up when they could not find them in their area, attended the first meeting. During this last week we had three more people contact us needing to attend a course on the weekend, so I held a makeup day on Wednesday to catch those three up.  Now we have a group of six meeting on Saturday and already have 5 signed up for Monday with another 3 who have expressed interest. 

I found out that we are the only center in the whole five mission area offering the courses until next summer.  I would think that every center would understand that young people often do not plan to far ahead and would prepare for the event that there would be last minute needs.  Oh well, We are happy to help them and maybe in the course of the next few weeks we can instill some responsibility into their thinking and cause them to better plan and be prepared for future events.

It appears that we are quickly getting into action and we only hope that soon our computer equipment will come in and we can get them operational for all of the participants that are showing up for the services. 

We had a real fun experience on Christmas day when we went over to the house where the missionaries in the MTC are housed, to fix them breakfast.  The cooks and staff have Christmas off so we were asked and quickly volunteered to help.  It was so fun being there with those fine young missionaries and feeling their spirit and joy as they were in the MTC preparing to serve their mission.  I have a few pictures that of the festivities.

 I do not know if you have any friends or someone you know who is in the Santiago MTC just now but look at the faces and see if you know any of these missionaries. 

We met some from Peru, Ecuador, Argentina, Brazil, and over half of the missionaries were from the US.  As you may see the sun was pretty bright and the temp was about 75 at that time of the day.  All of them elected to eat outside on the patio.  
 
After breakfast they got a rousing game of volleyball going in the back yard.  Those who were not playing volleyball were kicking a soccer ball around waiting for their turn.  

They snapped a shot of us as we were preparing to clean up after breakfast.  From left to right:  Elder and Sister Jacobson, then Elder and Sister Olsen (who is the mission psychologist),  Then Chris and I. 

 

 These three sisters are from Brazil serving in Chile.  So they are learning Spanish. 

All of the missionaries received Santa hats with twinkling stars on the head band.  I did not see anyone who was missing home on this Christmas day.  

We were pleased that the opportunity for service came up and we were able to participate. 

We have also had a number of parties and fun with the other Senior missionaries.  I must explain that there are three groups of Senior missionaries that we associate with here.  We have one group who are called to serve in the temple which are working when some of the rest of us are off.  There is also a group who are MLS missionaries who work with some of the weaker wards and Branches and in the mission office.  Then there is the group that we are part of.  We are assigned to the Church office building and work in different capacities.  The Johnsons are the Mission Medical Missionaries, The Gouldings who are the Humanitarian - welfare missionaries, the Olsens who are the Psychologist missionaries for the Chile Missions, then there are Chris and I who are assigned to PEF- self reliance.  There is another couple who were assigned to the offices as legal counsel who is the Elder who had the heart and aorta problem and as soon as he is well enough will be sent home.  So,  the four of us who are assigned to the office building get together quit often and have become good friends. 

We got together for Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Family home evening (twice during the holidays), and New Years Eve.  We feel like we have had a two week party.  Now, it is time to go back to work.  We are happy to have these days come.  To much food but a lot of fun.  It is the same here as in the US, during Christmas to New Years there are two weeks of nothing happening in the office building.  That was actually ok for us because we could have or self reliance courses without interruption.

Another event that I had failed to mention is that the temple has open baptisms from 6 -8 on Tuesday and Thursday.  So guess who was called to serve as temple workers for Tuesday evening Baptistery?  They are so short handed that they need help from outside the temple missionaries and other workers to staff the baptistery on those days.  Other Senior couples have been called to help as well on the other days.  So we are serving in the Temple with another Senior Couple from the Mission office, Elder and Sister Mayer.  Some times our mission duties do not allow us to serve in the temple which is why there are two couples called each session.  I am enjoying it and really love the youth that are coming.  It is just like the Houston open Baptisms we see the same youth week after week coming to serve.  We have had some who have travelled by bus for several hours for a baptism session then turn around and travel a couple hours back home.  The Youth here are as amazing as they are back home and I love to work with them. 

Last week, the day after Christmas, we had another  "My Path to Self Reliance" devotional with the missionaries who were returning home this week. These young men and women are from the US, Canada, as well as from most of the Latin American Countries.  They are a powerful force going back to the world and if they remain faithful have the ability to set the world straight.  We had 36 missionaries leaving the Chile Santiago East mission and it will take four months to replace them.  The Mayers told me that the Christmas beak and summer are big influx and release periods.  It would be a hard job keeping all of that organized.  What is a big help is the semester in South America are from March to December so we get a lot of missionaries from South America called in the Jan - Mar period as well.  Still more then half of the missionaries are from the US and Canada.



 This is the group from Santiago East Mission. I must tell you about one of the young men in this Group.  His Name is Elder Jahco  from Peru.  He is the small elder in the center holding up the placard.  He and his brother were homeless and living on the streets when the missionaries found them.  They accepted the Gospel and a year after his baptism he goes on a mission thanks to the Church Missionary fund.  He has not had much education as he grew up but has been a successful missionary and is now a bit afraid to return home.  There is not anything waiting for him there as far as family except his younger brother. I talked to him briefly and told him to go to Lima and find the Self-reliance center (I gave him the address and phone number) and get registered for a PEF Loan.  He seem to be a pretty good mechanic wants to pursue that as a career.  I hope he follows up and is able to get connected and served.  He is one who really needs the help.  So those of you who donate to the Perpetual Education Fund, these are the people who are benefiting from that donation.  Most of the Latins here are depending on the fund for schooling.  There is so much good happening from that fund.

WE ARE HAPPY AND BUSY AND HOPE BE ABLE TO CONTINUE TO SERVE THE PEOPLE OF CHILE.