Church callings

I'll post a bit about our church callings/challenges we have here in our branch. I can only tell you a bit about Todd's calling. He'll have to give you details on it as I'm only an outside observer to his calling. This is a long, boring post. Feel free to skip reading this one. But if you're interested in minute details of a small, Amman branch it may be interesting.

Todd is the Priesthood leader. I don't really know the official title of his calling. Again, something he'll have to fill in. Basically it is a combo High Priest Group Leader and Elder's Quorum President. There aren't enough members to keep them separate so they have one leader for all. Todd does a great job leading them. Several members are new to the church and have some interesting ideas that don't necessarily square with church doctrine. It's caused a ruckus a time or two but so far I don't think anyone has refused to come back to church because of hurt feelings or strange doctrine being taught. This is thanks to Todd and other wise leaders who have spent much time meeting with said members and trying to convince them of things such as there are 3 members of the Godhead and not just one. In this sense it is like a mission but he's teaching basic doctrine to members of the church who've already been baptized. There is also some poverty-type situations in the branch so he spends time helping those in need. Social Services here in Jordan is not as advanced as in the States. The church also has to be careful about what they offer to part-member families. The church could get into trouble if non-member Jordanians feel the church is interfering too much in their family life. So Todd is learning what government services are available so members can help themselves.

I have two callings--librarian and music chairman. I really like both.

A friend of mine said on her blog once that after she was called as YW President she was so happy to go clean out and organize the YW closet. She loved throwing things out. I had entire room to organize as there has never been an official library in this branch--or at least that's my understanding. Unfortunately though I have inherited my dad's view that "someone might need that someday."

Attempts have been made to get it organized so I'm just building on what has been done before. The thought in the past has been to have not only a church/branch library but to combine it with a cultural center library. Well meaning members throughout the years have contributed to the library by donating old textbooks, games, non-church videos, baby books, etc. But when I was called I was given the instruction to make it a functional church library. That meant "going by the book" and throwing out everything that wasn't officially approved by the church as well as throwing out outdated materials. Or the official way of putting it is "disposing" of those things.

Along with unapproved items I have found stacks of outdated stuff. I think since there was nobody in charge, people just kept ordering new things rather than check in the library to see if those things were already stashed somewhere. For example, there were over 40 outdated Duties & Blessings of the Priesthood books and over 40 unopened (still wrapped in plastic), outdated LDS Woman manuals--ALL 80+ of them in Arabic. We don't even have that many English speakers, let alone Arabic members. Since they're outdated now, they had to go.

But since I still have my dad's idea that things like this could be useful, the Branch President and I decided before I "dispose" of these things we will set them out for members to take for use in their own homes. Much of the information is still very relevant. "Give away day" starts this Friday. After the give away, I will be disposing of them properly :)

After the inventory of what could stay and was still useful, we ordered things that were missing that should be in a church library. We'll gradually add more as needed. One of the first things I'll be ordering will be new/more pictures. We have very few. The most recent large 1st Presidency picture is of President Benson. If any of you are familiar with the Gospel Art Kit, our libary had 2 3/4 of these. But they were so old that ours didn't have the additional pack that came out a few years later with additional pictures. When I went to order the add-on pack to make our Kits complete, I was told even the add-on packs are so old that they don't even sell them separately anymore. So we need to replace the whole Kit. OK--those are the library challenges.

Music I thought would be a simple, easy, ideal calling for me. Ya know, pick out the hymns for Sacrament Meeting, have a special musical number once a month (per the Branch Presidency's request), make sure each row of chairs had books. WRONG!

I don't know when it started but for singing in Sacrament Meeting we had been using a notebook that combined Arabic and English hymns. We'd sing a verse in English and then a verse in Arabic. For those of us who didn't speak Arabic, those verses were transliterated so we could make the sounds and sing along. Even though I had know idea what words we were singing, it was fun to think I was singing a hymn in Arabic.

However, the plastic notebooks were really falling apart. Pages were falling out, some were out of order, etc. So I asked the Branch Presidency if I could get new notebooks and kind of put them back in better order. The response I received surprised me. I was told to do away with the notebooks for the time being til some decisions were made and to just use the green hymnbook. The theory was the English members were just singing jibberish to them and that wasn't the purpose of hymn singing. True--I agree. Unfortunately though it meant that if we only sing in English, the handful of Arabic members don't get to participate in the singing. And that was the response when we used only the green hymnbook. The Arabic speaking members were upset with me that I had come in and changed the system that to them seemed to be working so well. So what to do?

Basically it evolved into creating a new notebook. One side will have hymns in English, the other side in Arabic. We (meaning I) would take out the transliterations and people could sing in whatever language they wanted. Of course not all hymns have been translated and the hymns that have been translated don't have all the verses translated. So Todd helped me for several hours one day and went through the hymns that have been translated to determine which verses had been translated. Then I went through and deleted the non-translated English verses so when we sing it, we sing the same number of verses that are translated. Make sense? Probably not.

Before you church musicians get crazed about leaving out some verses of the hymns, let me refer you first to pg. 381 of the hymnbook AND that I was told the old notebook had been "approved." By whom, I don't know. But if it was "approved" leaving out some verses, then I figure it's still "approved" to leave some out. However, it was decided we would leave all the verses in for the Sacrament Hymns and the Arabic members will just repeat their verses. We are hoping that more verses and more hymns will be translated.

After making the new notebook we had to decide how to present it. Bind it? Another cheap plastic notebook? If we bind it then it becomes more difficult to add in new translations. Another cheap notebook means someone will have to redo it again in a few months. Approval was given to use sleeve protectors and 3 ring binders. Easy to change out if needed but hopefully will hold up better. Those have been ordered from the States and are on their way.

Since we ordered the binders and protectors from the States, it meant the papers needed to be 8 1/2 X 11 inches. That is not the standard here in Jordan. In getting estimates I went to a print shop who said they could print them in American size. When I went back to actually get them printed they didn't know what I was talking about. They said they could print them on A4 paper and suggested I could cut them to the size I needed. I have a craft paper cutter I bought in Utah for $5.00. Think it'd make it through 12,000 pages? Think I wanted to cut 12,000 pages 3 at a time? I called another print shop that I hadn't been to before and they said they would cut them at no extra charge (Yeah Doculand!) They did print them and I went to pick up my boxes the next day. I got them home, put them in a sheet protector I had here to see what it'd look like--and they were about 1/4" too long.

Because I didn't look them over before I got them home, I thought for sure I'd be pulling out that craft cutter and spending the next several weeks making them right. I thought that because when I took them in there was some confusion as to the actual size of American paper. I told them it was 8 1/2 x 11 inches. Somebody there said 11 inches is 28 centimeters. Doculand didn't have an "inches" ruler to check it so I just agreed if he knew it was 28 cm then that must be correct. I did call and I told them they were too long. They told me to bring them back but they did give me the lecture that I had agreed to make them 28 cm. I took them back, they pulled one out of the box, measured it, and it measured 28 1/2 cm. Whew! Their mistake. They had them all recut by the next day and they look great. Now we're just waiting for the binders and protectors to arrive.

I will recruit my kids, the Relief Society, and the mutual to help put them together. The next step can be a group effort.

I've decided that once the library is in order and this hymnbook is in order, than I really will have two easy callings. Just in time for summer and another possible move for us. Perhaps though I will leave something useful behind.