It's a Besonderes Life: Baptismal Highlight of the Mission!

To all of our Children and Grandchildren,

After having been involved in several baptisms during our mission, we think the highlight occurred yesterday as we were privileged to witness the baptismal service of Kaylee via FaceTime. We weren't sure we were going to get permission as photos are not allowed but we were aware of other similar situations where grandparents on missions were allowed to participate via a little digital technology. So we were thrilled to get in on a little of the action as Kaylee prepared to leave home and head to the church as well as enjoy the talks, the baptism itself and the confirmation. What a special day it was for all of us! We even got to see some of the family picture-taking afterwards. Now we're not going to say that it was any better than the baptisms of Amelia, Amy and Eric, all of which took place just before we left and which we were able to personally attend. But it was definitely the best baptism we've seen since we have been full-time missionaries! We loved the wise council and advice given by Trisha and Grandma Black on baptism and the Gift of the Holy Ghost as well as the lovely confirmation blessing offered by Grandpa Black.

It is truly amazing what we can do with this amazing technology that has been made available to us. The missionaries are loving their I-Pads and the scope of their use is always expanding. Although we failed to let the brethren know of the conflict, our usual Friday night Waffle Night started exactly at the same time as the funeral services for President Packer. Nonetheless, we were able to participate in that live as well. Primarily we saw the funeral cortege arrive on Temple Square and later leave and we listened to Elder Nelson's opening prayer and the talk from Elder Packer's son. The talks from Elder Ballard, Oaks and President Monson were able to be enjoyed later as recorded as we had quite a crowd there for a change with our current BYU contingent showing up in force.

While still thinking about technology, as we're writing this communication we're listening to the Orchestra at Temple Square performing "A Night in Vienna" on Elder Parker's resurrected Android cell phone. It has been truly wonderful to have that possibility again. Today we visited one of the wards we haven't been to in several weeks, unaware that it was their ward conference. It was quite interesting that one of our reasonably newly converted young singles living in that ward has been having some problems with depression. We wondered if she would be there but she's pretty good at her attendance and showed up to sit next to Sister Parker in Relief Society. The Stake Presidency and the Bishopric had decided that the theme for this ward conference would be on the same theme given by Elder Renlund at General Conference. "Latter-day Saints Keep on Trying." All three hours were focused on exactly what she needed to hear. Even Elder Parker contributed to the Sunday School discussion by reading Mosiah 34:13-15 which impressed him as appropriate to the topic.

The rest of the week went quite well, too. Home Evening had about twice the attendance of the week before and the Institute class in English continues for awhile as long as anyone wants it to. From three last week, it doubled also to six this week with all of the stalwarts now missing but new members attending from BYU, a returned missionary sister from Hungary, one from Italy and one from Chile. It's nice we all have a language we can unite on to communicate!

We did have a little time on Saturday to see a few more sights of Vienna. It seems like this city has more to see than we can ever take in completely. We found the site of where the building once stood where Mozart died, now replaced by a large department store named after St. Stephen's cathedral "Der Steffl".

Then we moved to a fairly new church by Viennese standards,

only 250 years old or so but which claims to have the oldest still functioning organ in the city. Outside stands a statue of Moses. We wonder if he would approve?

And finally quite an interesting group of landmarks all dedicated to the humility and repentant feelings of today's neutral Austrians as they commiserate over all of the evils perpetrated by the fascism represented by the years they were governed by National Socialism, the Nazi's.

Here represented is an old Jew who was forced to scrub the streets on his hands and knees, actual occurrences of which were well known. Ignorant tourists were occasionally found sitting and resting on the monument so they elected to cover it in barbed wire as a further depiction of the subjugation of the Jews prior to 65,000 of them being deported and murdered in concentration camps. Nearby is a large stone monument which carries the new Austrian Declaration of Independence inscribed upon it, written in 1946 and a prelude to Austria being granted the right to function again as a country in 1955. Most of the official publications of the church note that it was also officially recognized in Austria in 1955.

We were hoping to be able to attend a temple sealing in Frankfurt later this month as another one of our recently baptized young sisters (about 2 years ago) makes that big step but the Frankfurt temple is closing in September for two years for expansion. That coming on top of the Freiberg Temple already closed for a year for similar purposes, the Europeans are crowding in for last minute attendance and we were a bit too late to get into the crowd. Oh well. We will be able to attend the preceding wedding here in Vienna this coming Friday and will then have to content ourselves with a Senior Conference to Switzerland and the Bern Temple in September. We were asked this past week to lead a discussion on ideas to stimulate and help the Young Single Adults on the second day of that conference so that will keep us busy.

[Sister Parker] This week we began to read the Pearl Of Great Price, where once again I was impressed that Adam received the complete fullness of the gospel of Jesus with priesthood authority. The ordinances of baptism, by immersion, and the receiving of the Holy Ghost were all given to Adam, Eve and their children. As Grampa said, the highlight of the week was being able to see Kaylee's baptism on Face Time. Interesting how the spirit is transported through the cyber-net. I truly felt a beautiful sweet spirit come across. It is such a joy to see our grandchildren receive the ordinances of the gospel. I think the Savior is pleased that we are among the faithful followers of this day. We just need to keep trying to do what's right and help each other along the way.