New Stakes in Accra, Marriage problems

Hello Family and Friends,

How was everyone's week? Mine was really pretty good but I'm going to apologize ahead of time because this email is going to be a bit short. We have a mission tour today with Elder Ted R. Callister, so that will take up most of our P-day. Not a whole lot of time to chat with everyone. This past Sunday we had a big conference for all the stakes in Ghana. We all gathered at the Ghana National Conference Center and they reorganized all of the stakes and we heard from Elder Callister from the Presidency of the Seventy. Now we have 7 stakes in Accra. Our mission had some changes in districts and zones this last transfer in preparation for the new stakes. Now there is one zone per stake.

Well for this week we had a bit of a struggle with some of our investigators. So, in order to understand it all, I have to explain a bit about how marriage works here in Ghana. First it's ridiculously difficult to get legally married in Ghana. The reason is because of the traditional marriage. The first step in the traditional marriage is called "the knocking." This is where the guy goes and "knocks" on the door of the girl’s family and offers like maybe a crate of soda or something and asks permission to like date the girl. If the girl and the parents both agree then the parents create a "list." of things to give to the family before they can be married. This is called the "bride price." Usually it's ridiculously expensive. The parents usually ask for a whole host of random items and it can take years to pay off. The problem is that most people will do the knocking and get the list and then move in together. So you all can probably see where this is going. People can be living together for 5 to 10 years and still have not paid the entire "price." Until the parents agree that the price is paid then they will say that they are married and now they are considered legally married. Well, we had two families investigating that we were planning on baptizing very soon but this week as we were teaching each family, they told us that they weren't legally married. One family had been living together for about 5 years the other about 10 years but because they don't have the money they haven't been able to actually get married. Well this causes a big problem for us because obviously we can't baptize them until they are keeping the commandments and as far as they are not married they're not keeping that commandment. Ugh. So yeah missionary work is not easy. Disappointment comes often, but it's okay. Other than those two disappointments the week has been pretty good.

Missionary work is truly a blessing to all especially to us missionaries. I really love being here and teaching the people about the gospel. Yes, it's not easy but it's definitely worth it.

Love,

Elder Smith