Russell and Eileen's Church Missions: LOVING ONE ANOTHER

One of the greatest blessing that comes with our call is the opportunity to meet and serve with the other senior missionaries both here in Frankfurt (in the Europe Area Office) and with the Welfare/Humanitarian couples serving in various countries of Central & Southeast Europe and Cape Verde. These are great individuals who are striving to do God’s will by serving their fellowmen.

It would be misleading to represent our situation as perfect or that all our interactions with our fellow missionaries are without challenges. We are all human, imperfect beings struggling to fulfill our missionary callings. We all have our own personalities and idiosyncrasies. It appears that part of God’s purpose in putting us here on earth is to give us the opportunity to learn how to get along with one another, to learn how to work productively and peaceably together. The longer I live the more I am convinced that achieving the second goal is more important than the first.

Each month Eileen prepares a newsletter containing a short article from each of our Welfare/Humanitarian couples describing what they are working on. This newsletter goes out to scores of people, both here in Europe and Church Headquarters in Utah. This month an experience related by a senior sister missionary serving in Sicily, struck us as particularly poignant. We have included it below.

"This month we had the sobering and heart wrenching experience of volunteering with MEDU (funded by LDS Charities) at a refugee disembarking and inside the Hotspot at Pozzallo. This was an Italian Coast Guard rescue of 392 men, women, and children. Before disembarking begins, the medical teams get organized in the triage tent. Giulia, MEDU doctor, had her brown leather medical bag, plastic gloves shoved in back jean pocket and face mask just around her neck. We watched as Giulia knelt by patient after patient. Smiling, holding their hands, comforting and reassuring them. She wants their first interaction in Italy to be kind and welcoming. The doctors and nurses somehow moved smoothly from patient to patient. The smell of human sickness, suffering, and sweat was over powering.

"The brutal heat made it very physically demanding for everyone. The refugees sit on the ship deck for hours under the sun while doctors in full hazmat suits assess medical needs. Critical cases and pregnant women are disembarked first and brought right to the medical area. Some are loaded onto stretchers and into waiting ambulances to go to hospital. Finally, the others are allowed off the ship, one at a time. They are photographed and given a wristband with a number, Flip Flops and a water bottle. Buses transport them to the nearby Hotspot. The MEDU team keeps track of torture cases, children, critical medical cases, and those in need of psychological counseling. The refugees all look dazed, bewildered and exhausted.

"The Hotspot is a gigantic warehouse-type building inside the port, fenced in and heavily guarded. The refugees line up to be checked for scabies, fingerprinted, and given an initial entry interview. They each receive a large backpack with clothes, food, and water. There is an area with sinks, showers, bathrooms. The huge main room has rows and rows of blue metal bunkbeds and also mattresses covering a large section of the floor. The MEDU team continues to assess the most vulnerable people, and the psychologists and cultural mediators spend individual time with them. Giulia goes nonstop to check on the sick and injured. The MEDU team coordinator handed me a scrawny, frightened 8 month old baby whose mother was at hospital and father was not functioning. It was a tender blessing to be able to comfort, feed, and hold that baby boy that first night. On the second day in the Hotspot, we talked with individuals, found answers to their questions, and recorded their stories for MEDU. These people step off that ship with nothing. They have no idea what the future holds. So far in August, MEDU has assisted three disembarkings and a total of 530 refugees at this one dock in Sicily."

Sister missionary with refugee baby

We went hiking on Saturday with a woman from our office. Gabi is 78 years old and in wonderful physical condition and rides her bike or hikes through this forest near her home.