Week 53

Hey Everyone!  

So I had a bomb email all written out and then it got deleted   and now I don't have a lot of time.  This week was really good!  Better than last week.  

J...the daughter of A.... is gonna get baptized on the 16th of November!  We invited her this week and she said yes.  Hopeful her Mom and Aunt can also be baptized!  Pray for them especially Ch... who needs to find a job.  It would help all of their situations a loooot if they could speak Italian.  So we are also teaching the them Italian too!  

Other things happened this week but I don't have a lot of time and I don't remember a lot.  I love all of you sooo much.  The Gospel is true.  Sorry for the lame email.

Ciao!

Week 52

Ciao everyone!  
How are you doing? I hope everyone is doing well and also doing a lot of missionary work.

This week has been kinda different from last week.  Mainly it's been harder.  We took some hits with people who haven't been answering us and who have been giving us bidones and stuff like that.  Yesterday was the worst of it.  We had a bomb day full of appointments planned and we were pumped up for it.  Every single apponitment either fell through or we got a bidone.  It was rough.  

And then also when we saw A... and his family this week we had prepared to the best of our ability.  We had fasted for them, prayed, prepared a bomb lesson with a musical number and everything.  We felt that we needed to teach them more about prayer.  We taught them about the difference between saying prayers and really praying.  Because every time C... always says, "yeah I pray every day it's my spiritual food"  And that's super amazing.  But we didn't feel that she had prayed specifically to know if she should be baptized.  For some reason when we taught about that she didn't take it well.  She said "I have to pray about finding work, about finding a place to live, about my documents, and you guys want me to pray about baptism!??"  It was kinda sad.

But I kinda learned a couple things from that experience and from this week.  The first thing is that fasting and prayer is powerful.  But it cannot overcome agency.  That is the one thing faith can't do.  BUT we WERE blessed because we fasted with faith.  We were just blessed in other ways.  That night we found two more people to teach while waiting for the train and then on Sunday A.. brought his friend who seemed to really like what was said in church and is likely interested in the message.  Sometimes the Lord blesses us in ways that we didn't expect or even not in the way that we wanted.  

I think that I need to take some of my own advice and stop saying prayers and actually pray.

Anyways yeah it was a hard week, and I was a little discouraged but that's alright.  Sometimes I just need like a couple minutes of pity party where I'm like "dang this sucks" and then just shake it off.  Don't dwell on it.  And keep on going.  I think it's those moments where God's testing you to see what you'll do.  

This next week will be better.  I hope you guys are trying to help the missionaries back home because yah never know if you could be the answer to fasting and prayer on their part.  That goes for everybody not just the missionaries.

So yeah that was the week.  Today we are going with some members and we are gathering some chestnuts and were gonna roast them up and eat them.  It's gonna be sick.  I got the chestnuts roasting on an open fire,  now I just need some mistletoe...  It's been a while.  I'm kiiiiiiiiiiding!!  It really hasn't been that long...  I'm kiiiiiiiiiding!

Anyways that's all folks.  I love you guys and miss you guys.  Be good and sing.  Tell the grills to getoutfromwayfromroundemboys

Love Drew

Week 51

Hey Famary!  

How are you guys?  I am doing well here.

We have seen a lot of miracles/spiritual experiences this week.  So we were able to teach A... and C.... and their family again.  This time we brought the Sorelle and did kinda a musical number.  I brought my viowin, Sorella Caroca brought her guitar and we played I am a Child of God while our companions sang.  It was so good that by the end we had all of them clapping their hands African-style.  That is where they alternate which hand is on top hahaha.  It was really good because it brought the Spirit there so well. It also led into our lesson which was the Plan of Salvation.  We were able to testify so strongly of Heavenly Father's plan for us and of the family being eternal.  It was really good.  There have been some really great lessons and some really so/so lessons in my mission but this one was gudu.  I really felt the gift of tongues.  Even though it was in English.  BUT I'm trying to learn a little bit of Twi since they are all from Gana.  Every time we go over there I ask them to teach me some stuff and they will say something and I will repeat it back to them and they will laugh and laugh haha.  I really genuinely love them.

Another miracle is that we found another family to teach!  The Br... family is from Serbia but have been here for a while.  Their daughter was taught by the Sisters but then she went to Rome.  One day we just decided to pass by their house because we only had an address for them.  The door was literally open and I was like "hey are these the Bs?" and they were like "yeah come in and teach us!!!"  Miracle.  We taught them the restauration and it went really really well.  The Mom, the Aunt and the Son were way into it.  Fr... was like maybe 9yrs old and was watching TV, but a little bit into the lesson he turned it off and started listening intently.  He was super happy when we gave him his own copy of the Book of Mormon.  Miracle.  Yeah if you ask me, he needs to get his TV watching skillz up to par because when I was his age and watching TV, you couldn't do anything to get me to turn it off let alone turning it off for a siritual message.  

And then another miracle: We were coming home from doing calls in the church and this Raga (like a punk kid) comes up on a bike and starts heckling us as he passes.  We just ignored it because it happens quite frequently.  He had already passed us and was a good distance away but then outta nowhere he does a full 180 and comes to talk to us.  He is really cool and his name is G...  He is an aspiring rapper haha.  We talked about music and weed and Jesus and then got his number.  I think he's gonna come play soccer with us this Saturday!

K... is still doing great!  He plays soccer with us still, but now he is taking the lessons!  Kindof a funny story.  Anziano Moss and I were thinking and praying about him and we both decide to take things slow and become his friend first.  Then the first week that Anziano Ward got here, the Sorelle were all like, "We have an appointment with him and his family!"  and I was like whaaaaaa!?  I guess I am just happy that he can now be taught the lessons and that is the most important thing.

So yeah sorry I just spent most of this email talking about the work but that is what is on my mind (hard spiritual flex).  

Conference was really heckin good this year.  I am suuuper excited for this coming April.  Yeah also my favorite was probably the one that said read the Book of Mormon erday erday erday.  Either that one or Elder Uchtdorf's Hobbit one.  That was a banger.  So was the Prophet's flex-talk where he showed off all that the Church does as humanitarians.  

Did you guys do my invitation from last week?  if you didn't you know who you are and I invite you again to do some missionary work by talking with a friend about the  Book of Mormon or something churchy.  Do it!  

I love you guys so so so much.  Make sure you re-read conference talks this week! 

Sincerely Anziano Tagg

Week 50

Hey Everyone!  

How's it going?  Things here are great.  This week was kinda crazy because it was transfer week and I had to go to Milano and come back to pick up my Greenie.  I have a figlio!!!! (a son in Italian)  He's awesome his name is Anziano Ward and he has red hair like me.  Sometimes it seems like President Browning chooses companionships just based on these things and not like inspiration and stuff like that.  I'm kiiiiiiding. 

So yeah Anziano Moss is gone and that's pretty sad.  He was a really good guy and a really good companion.  I'm gonna miss him.  I learned a lot from him.  I hope I can do the same for my son.  

But yeah now I have a brand new start ahead of me it's pretty cool.  My comp is from Blanding Utah.  He's actually strangely my first comp from utah.  He had to visa wait in New Mexico and he served on a Navajo reservation so that's  kinda cool.  He's got some cool Navajo ties and knows some navajo language.  Too bad he doesn't know any Italian what so ever.  I'm kiiiiiiding.  He actually is really bravo with the language for only being here a couple days.

Btdubs Ch.... will be baptized this month on the 26th.  It was an amazing experience challenging her to be baptized.  The Spirit was so strong.  At first she was hesitant but she said yes and then she was soooo happy after she accepted the invitation.

And to add on that the rest of A...'s family finally came over from Nigeria and we were able to teach them and the happiness was just contageous.

Well I am pressed for time so I've gotta go.  I love you all!

Ciao

Week 49

Hey Maham, hey Daddio, hey Brynbo, hey Laud-bod, hey E-rail, hey N-rail!!

So this week was pretty dang good.  We've been really trying to get things up and moving with the work.  It's been wroking pretty well!  the first couple weeks here were rough because it was Ferragosto and everybody was away for vacation. So it was hard to get appointments and stuff and then the appointments that we did have fell through a lot.  But these last couple of weeks have been really good.  We've been pretty busy visiting members and getting in contact with old investigators and teaching.  I really like it when we get to teach in a home setting.  It's always such a good environment to teach in.  

One thing that happened last week that was really cool was the ward mission leader and one of the ward missionaries organized a meeting with all of us missionaries and we discussed what the  needs of the Branch and what we can do to work together to help with the missionary work.  IDK if I already told you guys that that happened.  But yeah it was super cool of them and we came up with a kind of plan together.  We want to build up our English class pian piano (step by small step) and at the same time start doing serate familiari (FHE) every other friday night.  I works out pretty well because we already do activities every Friday with the English class and so now every other Friday we will invite them to the Family Night with the ward.  Hehehehe -sneaky.  

But yeah that's the plan we just need to get on it and start these Family Nights.  Our plan with Ch... is to baptize her and we think she's ready we just need to ask her.  It has been hard to meet with her this week but we have an appointment tomorrow.  Pray hard for her!  She came to church last Sunday and was just sooo happy for some reason.  I asked her why and she said it was because we taught her how to pray.  It was funny she was like clapping along to the prelude music hahaha.  She's great.

You guys should pray also for K...  He is this really awesome 15 year old kid and we play soccer with him.  We just need to pian piano (step by step) make an amicizia (friendships) with the ward members who come play with us and then give him a Book of Mormon and then invite him to church and hopefully share our message with him.  He is super cool.

So yeah that's the haps here in good'ol Ravenna.  I hope all is well back home.  It sounds like everything is.  Tell Brynbo that if she wants to be popular she needs to be a bully.  That's what I did.  Same goes for Laud-bod and same goes for Daddio at work.  I'm kiiiiiiiding

Dang it sounds like Audrey is taking some hard classes this year what is it her sophmore year?  I didn't even take those classes that she is taking now.  Has she given any thought to what she wants to study when she graduates? (said in a very parenty/teachery way).  I think in anatomy you disect a cat.

Paisely sounds like a nice name for Nathan's daughter!  I'm really excited to see her! when she's born tell her that is wants to be popular she needs to be a bully.   That sucks that Jocelyn had kidney stones while she was pregnant!  oofa as the Italians say.  you could also say aia or osta or accidenti.  How far along is she again?

Dang it sounds like the home ward is poppin with baptisms.  Correct me if I'm wrong but when I was growing up it didn't seem like we had a single baptism from the missionaries.  Boh! But good luck on your talk Mom slam her with that HG wisdom.

That's it for now.  I love you all.  I challenge every one of you (as a missionary so you have to do it) to invite someone to church or to an activity or talk about the Book of Mormon with them.  And I promise all of you (as a missionary so it has to come true) that if you open your mouth with faith even if it might be hard, the Lord will make your words powerful.  The missionaries in your ward need help from the toughy Taggs.  Do It.

Anziano Tagg

Week 48

Hey Famiglia, 

How are you?  I hope all is well and I hope you guys know how much I love you and miss you.  But not too much cuz I'm not trunky  just yet.

So I might be a little short on time today.  We are going to San Marino.  It's the first time I've been there in a long long.  It should be fun.  I'll send some pictures.  

Things are going well here.  We just had Zone conference and interviews yesterday and It was really cool.  I really like those meetings they are always spiritually edifying.  

Then after the meeting I had an interview with President Browning.  He is a great man.  He seemed a little stressed though.  It must be really hard to run a mission.  Especially because lately there have been a lot of problems with visa waiters and greenies coming in halfway through the transfer.  I did tell me that they have 13 greenies coming in the next transfer and asked me if I was ready to train if needed.  

He also asked me a bunch about Cuneo because Anziano Ruiz is gonna die next transfer and so for the Branch Presidency there it needs to either be an Italian there or a new missionary.  President asked me to give HIM advice about what to do if he needed to put a new missionary as Branch President, or if the stake should choose an Italian member.  He's deciding weather or not he should keep missionaries in there as the Branch leadership.  So yeah I'm basically running the mission.  But no for reals for reals I need to pray about that and talk to the Mission President about it.

The rest of the week went really well.  We had another lesson with Ch... and the spirit was soooo strong  Actually it ws kind of a miracle that we were able to see her because we heard during the week that she had gone to Germany.  But then she just showed up in church because apparently she was stopped at the boarder and there was a problem with her documents or something.  She was pretty bumbed about that.  But her brother was able to testify in out lesson and he said, "she does not undastand that God send her back to Italy"  Then we talked a lot about prayer and how she can  recognize her answers.  At the end we asked her if the knew the Book of Mormon was true, she said yes.  Then we asked her if she knew that Joseph Smith was a prophet and she said yes.  and then Anziano Moss was about to smash her with that Bap invite and she interupted him to ask why Joseph Smith was not talked about in the bible.  🤦‍♂️

So yeah we explained that and then we had to go per forza because he had to catch our train.  Kinda sad.  But at least we know that critical information and maybe next time we will challenge her to be baptized.

Other than that I can't really think of stuffs that happened.  I hope all of you are doing good and I love you all so so so much.  

Ciao!

Week 47

Ciao fimiglia!  

How's it goin?  Thungs here are gudu like the little indian kid's brother that got lost.  

"Guduuuuuuuu!"

Anyways we had a good week full of work.  Right now in our area we are trying to meet with a lot of people but unfortunately like our second week here we had like 7 bidoni.  So now we're just kinda trying to recover from that.  I would say that this area has a lot and a lot of people that have potential to be interested.  We just need to meet with them and get things going.  We have been able to meet with this lady named Ch... who is the sister of a member.  We have had two really great lessons with her and her brother.  We even asked her if she would be baptized because she told us that she knows the Book of Mormon is true.  She said that she had already been baptized in another church.  So the next time we re-did the restoration that the Sorelle had done before and really focused on authority.  It went super well there was a really strong spirit especially during the first vision.  We then invited her to pray.  We'll see how it goes.  Pray for her because she really needs to find a job otherwise she is gonna have to move to Germany.

Basically the two important things we are doing this transfer are building relationships with members, meeting with potentials, and make area book calls to send the privacy notice that the Church wants us to send.  That way a whole bunch of people won't get whiped out from area book and their salvation will still be a posto and stuff

Other than that, this week we were able to do some really good service on Saturday.  We went to a member's house and painted the whole thing.  Pictures below.  It was a good time.  We are thinking of looking into some other good service opportunities.  We wanted to go this week to the Caritas which is like a soup kitchen and see if we can volunteer there.  

But yeah that's basically what's goin' on.  Oh yeah the other week Anziano De Feo came and spoke to us.  He's from southern Italy.  It was really really cool.  An interesting thing he told us is that our calling as missionaries is a part of the atonement of Gesù Cristo.  He didn't say that it's linked to the atonement or that it is possible because of the atonement he said it is PART of the atonement.  That was interesting.  He talked a lot about our calling it was really special.

Anyways how are you guys doing?  From Mom's email it sounds like all is well so that makes me gappy.  I meant what I typed.  To answer some of your questions Maham I do like Ravenna it's a nice city.  Probably Venice was my fav.  You don't get a prize for guessing correctly.

The other day I was asked to give a blessing all'improvviso in English.  I'm not used to it in English but it went well.  I've given my fair share of blessing out here in the field and it's always a really cool experience for me.  I don't think I've written about them.  This one was for a member named L... who's brother had just died.  I was prompted to tell him that he will see his brother again.  It was tender and all that.  L... is awesome.  He's from Liberia but talks like he's straight from the US.  He told us that he is the usher for sacrament meeting (it's a thing that Italians do.  They like to have an usher for sacrament meetings it's kinda strange)  but he was so pumped to tell us that he was able to be the usher he was like, "yeah for real man!  I'm the USHER!!! for real!!"  It was funny.

Well that's about it for this week.  I love you guys.  Hopefully I'll be able to call today.

Week 46

Ciao Famiglia!  How is everyone?

I'm really sad that I missed Dad's birthday run that sounded like a lot and a lot of fun.  If I was there I wouldn't have let Dad win  I hope he liked it though and I hope he liked my video that I sent.  It took like 17 takes to get it just right.  

Yeah Maham I remember when we went on missions for FHE and I totally faked all of you guys out by tricking you into thinking that I had done my mission in like 2 seconds....  Legend!  By the way about this whole serving a mission thing, I think I'm gonna just do everything I need to do still really really fast and then come home early and say "I did it!"  That would be the biggest prank of the century right there.  "So brother Tagg why did you come home from your mission early?"  "I finished it all early "

But yeah I miss those days too even if I don't remember a lot.  I do remember 'Super-Dog's Lost Mother' though.  Honestly, you guys make fun of Max's super power but pensandoci sleep-power would beat super strength, lightning, and acid in a heartbeat.  I also remember playing 'Cowkids' with Evan.  Sometimes those games of 'Cowkids' would last days.  Or we would just pretend like a day had past by laying down, "falling asleep" and then after like three seconds one of us would make the sound of a rooster crowing and it would be morning time again. Good times!

Anyways things here in Ravenna are going well.  It's been a little rough because we have gotten a tonnnnn of bidoni (cancellations) this week.  Literally I think everyday we had at least one appointment that fell through.  But hey, at least that means we have appointments that can fall through amIrite?  We've always been super busy though so that's really good.  

This week Anziano Mosteller call me and asked if I wanted to do a musical number with him for the mission tour which will be tommorrow.  Kinda late notice and it's kinda a hard piece, but I'm sure I'll be fine.  The only thing is we can't get together and practice until the day pf the concert.  So yeah pray for me.  It'll be fine though.  Something unusual did happen when I was playing last night though that Dad should probably know.  I was practicing for the piece and then this member came who also plays the violin and wanted to play with me.  I ended up playing the violin for a long long time and afterwards my hands were acting weird.  Ya know, like from before the mission when my right hand would get this kinda twitch?  it was like that but both of my hands.  It bascically felt like both of my hands fell asleep or cramped up a little and when I relaxed them they went all weird.  IDK.  could be just a cramping up of my hands but it seemed to be the same thing that would happen before the mission but worse this time because it was both of my hands.  So that's what made me worry a bit.  Don't worry too much you guys it wasn't that bad.

I'm sorry that Audrey had a bad experience at school.  Tell her to just getoutfromwayfromroundemboys.  Tell her also that I love her.  Also tell that to Brynbo.  But don't tell either one that I told the other one.

Anyways that's it for this week.  I'll try my best to call this week but it might be a little difficult this time.  I'll let you know.  I love you guys!

Ciao

Photos:
1 A brawl in the church (jk self defence activity)

2-4 Photos with the Branch.  They are awesome!

If you notice in one of those pictures the little kid in front is using the force on you guys so be careful.

Week 45

Ciao Famiglia!  Come state?

How is everybody doing?  Here things are doing really good.  I really like serving in Ravenna it's a cool city.  This past week we have been working super hard.  Every night I go to bed really super tired.  I kinda like that feeling.

The work here is actually a little bit good.  Not amazing because we are white-washing (starting fresh in a new area with no referrals to go off).  But it's pretty good for being here just one week.  We have met twice with this guy named L... and I think he has a lot of real potential.  He even has asked some questions about baptism!  but at the same time he has shown some signs of not wnating to be rushed or in fretta so I think we stilll need to wait.  He's a kinda quirky person. Also he's super nice.  He told us that he used to study with the Jehovah's witnesses and that they treated him really bad and made fun of him and hit him and even have been stalking him a little bit.  Those dang J dubs!  I don't know about the stalking bit.  Seems extreme.  

But yeah right now he's our main guy.  But we have a lot of others with real potential too.  We've been make a tonnnn of calls because we need to cantact literally everybody in our area book and talk to them about this document that the Church in Europe needs to send to them.  It's a new document that talks about personal data privacy and what the Church does with the personal data it collects.  So we need to inform everyone of this and send them the document or hand deliver it before the end of september or else everyone who didn't recieve it will be deleted.  That's right, cancelled.  The Church is doin' an order 66-type thing and there gonna send swat teams in and tanks and just wipe em all out.  President Nelson's really changing a lot huh?

This week we talked to a guy from Napoli and I felt like a greenie again.  I understood maybe like 50% of what he said.  The rest of it wasn't Italian.  He was speaking straight dialect.  Even when he said his name I misunderstood him and thought he said gelato.  His name was Gerardo

But yeah that's the gist of things.  How is everything going in Mrlnd?  Mom said that Eliza's braces are tightened and so she has to peel her apples off of her apples to eat them.  BRYNBO! IF YOU PEEL THE ENTIRE APPLE OFF OF AN APPLE THERE'S NOTHING LEFT.  

Also I laughed pretty hard at the image of Flubba gimping around like little brudda because her foot get's stuck in her collar all the time.  I miss her shannanagans.  Keep her alive ok?  

Also HAPPY BIRTHDAY DADIO I love you the most and don't you forget it.  I guess I'll give you double birthday punches next year... so that's like what 200 punches?

That's all for this week love you all!  Ciao

Anziano Tagg

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