Elder Dallin Layton-Rome, Italy: Another brother and a transfer to Naples!

Well mom,

I know that you want a REALLY long letter, but that is going to need to wait until next weeek becasue we had a lot of scheduling problems with members, the Sorellas, and some other things that I have to handle, so I really have NO time whatsoever to write today, unfortunately. I will try and give you all the information that you want though in the time that we have! Papa, thank you for your letter. I'll respond to it next week.

So, this week was INSANELY drama filled!!!! I will start with Monday. We had a family home evening with ________ and some members and that went really well! We made sure that we focused on making ________ really know that the B of M and the Bible go hand in hand and that both of them testify of Christ! The sisters were there and all of us bore some really good testimony. We all left that lesson feeling good! _________ told us that he understood why it was so important that he understood the principles we were teaching. It was a great lesson!

The drama happened a little later in the week. Wednesday we had a lesson with him and he expressed a little bit of insecurity about everything and asked how people would feel if he decided to push the day back a little bit. I told him that everyone would understand and that he should know for himself the truthfulness of what we are teaching and feel comfortable and confident in his decision before doing anyting. He said ok and we parted ways at that. He didn't say anything about changing the day other than that.

Friday comes (day of his interview). _________ shows up and cames straight up to me and looks me in the face with very pained eyes. "Layton, I don't feel ready. I need this certezza (absolute certainty) before I can make a decision like this. This is a change of my entire life and although I feel things I never have before, when I am alone, I question those feelings. I am not sure if I can do this right now." This took me for a serious ride to say the least. I introduced _________ to a member and leave him with the memeber for a little and was just pacing the hallway just freaking out! Right at that time, the man that came to do the interview (Anziano __________ da Roma) walked into the door. I needed to explain to him really quickly about what happened and also explain to ________ that we were going to do the interview still because maybe something that Anziano ________ would say would help him. _______ and Anziano ________ agreed and the interview lasted for about 45 minutes and when they both came out Anziano _______ agreed with me that _________ was a really good man and that he will be ready for baptism soon. ________ pretty much just shook my hand said good-bye and left. I was still at a loss for words and I had no idea even how to feel. For the rest of the night, Anziano ______ and I just talked. We were just flabbergasted (yes, I said flabbergasted) to say the least! I didn't go to sleep until 2 and I ended up taking apart a broken clock to try and fix it because I couldn't sleep. I was just................................... yah.

Saturday came and I was pretty tired to say the least (and the clock was still broken) but it was A FULL day! We saw ________ again during the morning and went to see his fishing boat. We went with the senior couple that is here and we had a lot of fun. We then met the Sisters for a lunch together at a friends house that we used to teach the gospel to:)! We ate SO MUCH FOOD!!!!!! More than Gaetano Saccà in Reggio!!! It was SO MUCH!!!! I felt like I was going to literally BURST! Afterwards, we went to a less active member's house with them to see if she needed a blessing because she is ill and then _________ picked us up again to go over to a members house (who is one of his really good friends) She is so awesome mom. She totally eased his concerns of what was going on in his head and let him know that she completely saw where he was coming from because she was once there. Saturday night he told us again that he wanted to be baptized the next day. AHHHHHH! I couldn't have been happier. What a week!