Bangued is Awesome

Hello Everyone! How was your week? Ours was amazing!

I wish I could put into words how happy I am to be here in Bangued and how great the work is here. Elder Jenson and I have been getting home late and waking up early because we have been so busy. It is awesome. To start off, I want to focus on one barangay here in Bangued. The towns here in the Philippines are separated into neighborhoods called Barangays. They have their own barangay captain to solve problems in the neighborhood, they have meetings, and they even have basketball tournaments against other barangays haha. One here, is called San Antonio. It is on the outskirts of the town and you have to cross over a bridge, and then go along the shore of the river to get to it. During the rainy season it is sometimes impossible to get to or out of San Antonio because the water raises and covers the path. By tryke it takes about 20 minutes if there’s no water on the dirt road. Everyone who lives there either plants rice or corn for a living, drives a tricycle, or makes cement. In April and May, two families were baptized making them the first members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in San Antonio and since then, the Gospel has spread quick through the Barangay. We go there a lot because there are a lot of people willing to listen to us. We walked back one night because there were no more trykes and it took us about 1 hour and 10 minutes haha. The new members of the Church help us all the time teaching and visiting those willing to listen to our message. At church yesterday, there were 10 different visitors all from San Antonio who came. Some had been before, and others were there for the first time. It was awesome! The price to get to Bangued is so expensive, and the road was flooded from the rain we have been in but they still decided to come. Their faith in Christ is a testimony builder to me and to the other members here in Bangued.

I am so grateful that I have met those from San Antonio and I hope to meet more as my time continue here in Bangued.



Elder Jenson and I also went finding for more people this week and within 15 minutes of walking and knocking on houses, me met a Muslim family, a Hindu family, and a Korean born-again pastor! It was so cool to meet and see the diversity of lives from around the world and through religion. I tried to say the 3 or 4 words that Wesley Thompson taught me in Korean at college to the pastor. I don’t think he understood though hahah so we called our Mission Office Missionary, Elder Kim who is form Korea! He was able to talk to the pastor and explain what we were doing at his house because he didn’t understand English or Tagalog.

I give that man so much respect for wanting to share his message so much that he went to his wife’s home country and is now trying to learn Ilocano in order to teach. That’s awesome.



On Saturday, there was a baptism for brother Reginald! He is from Pangasinan but has been taught by the missionaries here for a while and has now chosen to be baptized! He, along with 2 others from another Branch were baptized Saturday morning. It was a really peaceful service and full of the Spirit. President Bangal was there for a devotional that we had later that evening. The devotional was titled “Come Unto Christ” and focused 100% on what Christ did for us, and how we can come unto him. The missionaries in our zone sang songs, we had people bare testimonies about the Restored Gospel, and watched videos about Christ’s life. I really like the devotional.

On Sunday we taught the Mission Preparation class to the youth of the Branch and it was a balst. We practice talking to people and focused on how reading the Bible and the Book of Mormon can help us not only live the Gospel, but help others live it too.

I have loved being here and being lost in the work. I hope you all have a great week! Find the time to pray to our Father in Heaven, find the time to watch videos of Christ’s life on https://www.lds.org/bible-videos/?lang=eng  and find the time to call your family and tell them you love them. Ingat kayo!




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Elder Pitt