Mom,

10 Commercial Ave. Apt.# ULC
New Brunswick, NJ (I don't know the ZIP code)

It was a sad goodbye from Union City. I really started to love that place a lot. I miss it. We had some great members there. My area was really doing good as well. The area I'm in right now in New Brunswick is still a walking area! Except it's like three times as big as my area in Union City. Unfortunately, I think I might be getting shin splints... We'll see. New Brunswick is a pretty good area. It's a lot different than Union City. In Union City, the chapel was five blocks away from our apartment. Here in New Brunswick, the chapel is a 15 minute drive away in the next town over called East Brunswick. Since it's a walking area, we don't have a car. We had to call a member to pick us up on Sunday morning. I think that there are actually quite a few of members that have to call and ask for rides from other people to get to church every Sunday. Pretty crazy. I guess there are some members every week that don't go to church because they can't find a ride.

So the goodbye from Union City, we had a family home evening in the chapel on Monday night and we invited a lot of the members to come and say goodbye to us. I had made some pretty good friends in Union City. It kind of feels like my home in New Jersey. I'm definitely going to have to visit there after my mission. Many of the members told us that we're more than welcome to come back and visit. The Bishop told us that we always have a friend at his house and that we can come back and visit any time we want. Great ward!

This last week just consisted of walking around the New Brunswick area and trying to get to know the area. My companion is Elder Drewes. His family is living in Provo, but he has moved around a lot because his dad worked in the Air Force. He's an OBGYN now. I think he might know Brother Allen! My comp has only been in the mission for four months. So he's still trying to get a hold on the area. We're trying to figure out the best way to work in this area right now. It's fun, but it's a lot of walking.

There's some pretty cool members in this ward. There's a family by the name of Allongo. The dad just finished serving in our mission presidency. Just as he was finishing his service in the mission presidency, he got called to serve in the East Brunswick stake presidency. He's a pretty good guy. He does something with banks and his wife is a nationally certified Spanish-English translator. She translates things in courts. She knows English better than I do! They have two sons. One of them is named Michael. He served his mission in Germany. He is a prosecutor. He went to BYU law school. I asked him if he knew Wesley Harward. He said the name sounds familiar, so he looked up the name on Facebook. Turns out he's Facebook friends with him! He still didn't know him. But I guess they were in the law program at the same time. Also, Michael serves as the Elders Quorum President in our ward. He helps us out a lot in our missionary work. The Bishop is supportive of missionary work, but he doesn't go out of his way to help us out. So Brother Michael Allongo goes out of his way to help us out the best possible. It's pretty nice. He expects a lot from us, but that's good, because he's going to be helping us out a lot. He really has a determination to make sure this work goes as well as possible.

This family invited us over to dinner yesterday for Father's Day. They have nice house. It reminded me of home! She cooked very well and it didn't really seem like a very Hispanic dish. It was delicious!

It's going to take some getting used to here, but I think I'll be able to do it! It sounds like a fun ward!

Q of the W:

1.  What is your opinion on what is the great and abominable church?  Just wondering if anybody questions that scripture and what you tell them?

Well, Bruce R. McConkie said that the great and abominable church was the Catholic Church, but I don't think that that was ever accepted as doctrine. I think that he has a good point. I think that that it is very possible. I don't know if Nehpi was trying to describe one particular church group or many churches in one group under the category of destroying the ''plain and precious'' truths. I don't think that he specifies on that. Nehpi describes the great and abominable church as a church taking the ''plain and precious things'' away from the Church of the Lamb of God. So that includes pretty much every other church besides our church. I think that it's safe to say that any church that takes away the ''plain and precious'' truths from the Gospel would be included in the great and abominable church. I would think that it's safe to say that the Catholic Church was one of the very first churches to do exactly that. So that is my opinion.

2.   Do you know how many missionaries are in your mission?

I can't remember exactly how many there are. President Jeppson told us that it is now up to over 200.

3.  When you teach the less- actives or in-actives and they have already been baptized....what is their goal?  Just to go back to church and read the scriptures?

It depends on what they feel is important. A goal that I always tell them would be for them to get to the temple. President Jeppson told us that recent converts that go to the temple within six weeks of their baptism to do proxy baptisms have a 98% chance of staying active. Pretty high!

I liked the number 1 question of the Q of the W! Ask another good one like that!

Love you mom!

-Justin