Seeta branch: the Church in Africa

I think as a whole, the ten students that came to Uganda assumed that we would walk to the LDS branch that meets here in Mukono every Sunday. Turns out that all the research assistants have been paired and assigned to work in the Primaries in different branches around Mukono. Sweet deal, I thought, we get to sing and play and have an all around great time with little kids for two hours. I’m totally down! I’m assigned with Caleb (who served a mission in this area), and we’re in the neighboring Seeta branch. We arrived there early on Sunday morning and the branch president who was expecting our arrival invited us to join the leadership meeting he was holding with the missionaries and the rest of the branch presidency. After we introduced who we were and explained our assignment, the branch president said that the little branch was really struggling and that while our assistance would be appreciated in the primary, there were other areas that needed our service. Caleb emphatically offered our help wherever needed it most. I nodded my head in agreement.

Then president Okello dropped the bomb on me. “We really need someone in the Young Women’s.” Yikes. I wasn’t expecting to have any responsibilities with anyone over the age of twelve. Just short of being called as the president (who hasn’t attended church for the past several weeks, I am told), I was called as first counselor, and am basically the YW everything. President Okello gave me a manual only minutes before class started. Of course I masked my overwhelment, fear, and feelings of inadequacy with a smile. On top of this, he asked us to “introduce” ourselves in sacrament meeting which would be beginning almost immediately after our leadership meeting, and gave us up to seven minutes to do it. So, next week I should probably come prepared to be the main speaker in sacrament meeting, because I seriously feel that pres. Okello could at anytime ask me to pitch in. Ha. And what was the Young Women’s lesson on this week, you may ask? The organization of the Church. Ironic, huh? Man, does God have a clever sense of humor.