Senior Conference in Zollikofen, Switzerland

On March 20-22, 2014 we joined the other Senior Couple missionaries and some other guests for a conference in Zollikofen, Switzerland. There were about 30 of us in the conference. It was a wonderful experience. One of the most rewarding experiences was our group session in the temple on Thursday. They showed us a new temple film. The new films are not being shown in general here, because they are not yet translated into other languages. Since we all understood English, they let us see this film. It is only the second time they have used it here. Just being together with the other missionaries made it a special experience.

We had a number of workshops and presentations. Also some of the people performed some traditional music with local instruments. I added two short movies of them at the end of this blog.

One of my fun experiences was meeting an old friend, Armand Johansen. We went to high school together, both in music and performances together. He is with the Area Presidency office and was here as a guest with his wife. We also have two other missionaries here who served with me in my mission 43 years ago.

Here is one of the pictures I took of the temple. The weather was beautiful, as you can see, but it was all the more beautiful inside.

From the temple steps you can see across the area and see the alps in the distance.

We met in the stake center, which was right next to the temple.

This is a photo of those couples, the men of which served in the Central Germany (Düsseldorf) Mission at some time in the past.

Here is Armand and I with our wives.

In our discussions, we talked about how to help each other in the work. We have quite a few new missionaries this time. Being a senior missionary is an interesting experience. No matter how much you plan and prepare, the actual experience takes a lot of adjustment and learning. Each place and assignment is so different from the others. Some of us have small villages, some large cities. Most of the missionaries called here are Young Single Adult Center missionaries who work with the local institutes and young single programs in Europe. The church here has struggles, especially with the young people, since there are not many in one area for support and friends who are members of the church. Because of this, the Europe area is working to strengthen these young people and help them learn the Gospel together and to have activities together. Our people are part of the St. Gallen Stake, in Switzerland, so it is hard for our young people to get to meetings there, so we have a small Institute class here every Wednesday evening. Technically, we are not Young Single Adult Center missionaries, but are MLS (Member Leader Support) missionaries. One evening we had discussion sessions broken into these two groups of missionaries. I headed the discussion group for MLS missionaries and we had a marvelous time together helping one another learn how to work better with our wards and branches and our missionaries. With the "Hastening the Work" effort here, we play a critical role in helping the members strengthen and help the individual members.

[related item - this is a subject we discussed]
There is a world-wide effort going on right now to find lost members. Many of the members have been lost over the years. When they are no longer known to the local leaders, their membership records get sent to an "address unknown" file. Over the years, this had been a growing problem. Every quarter, a batch of old records are returned to the branch or ward which sent the records to "address unknown" to see whether a concerted effort can find these lost members.

In our branch, we have been able to find some, but many are just impossible to find anymore. You should all be aware of this work and help where you can. If you know of friends or relatives who are no longer involved with the church, see whether you can get their records to the correct wards or branches. We do a lot of work using social media, such as Facebook and have been able to locate some people. With the Lord's help. we can find more. We have found that some of these people are now interested in becoming more involved with the church. It is a great blessing to them.

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OK. After all that, here are some videos that might be fun to see and hear. These were part of our conference.

One of our missionary couples play the alphorn, a traditional instrument of the alps. 

This is a Quetsche or "Pull Harmonica." It is also a traditional instrument here. I just recorded a portion of her number.

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Lastly, I wanted to show this because it shows how expensive meat is in Switzerland. This advertises some dinners at our hotel. It is definitely not a 5-star hotel, so this is probably somewhat cheaper than many restaurants. The 200 gram (about 7 oz.) beef filet listed at the top is 42.50 swiss francs which is $48. It does include vegetables and one side dish.

Guten Appetit!