Journal January 12-21, 1964

We gave them the fourth discussion Thursday evening, and it was really neat. As for the Avirons, their first discussion was last evening, and their four beautiful children showed the way. The parents are nearly illiterate, but I believe they are sincere. This morning, I took a first-discussion visit with Elder Smith, in the home of an impressive Spanish family. It’s early to draw conclusions, but it wouldn’t surprise me [270] to see this family join the Church as well. January 19—The Castre family continues to get ready for baptism. Brother Castre is still having a hard time getting rid of his smoking habit, but he seems to be making progress. Unfortunately, he’s going for about his fifteenth operation to repair wounds from the Great War, and that may interfere with his baptismal plans.

His wife, on the other hand, is both ready and well-disposed; she hopes, though, that she and her husband can be baptized together. He was going to come to Sunday School this morning, with little Philippe, but they didn’t come. Don’t yet know why, but we’ll know tonight. We’re trying to get in touch with M Jean Royer, Député-Maire de la Ville de Tours. That title means that he’s both mayor and a member of the national Chamber of Deputies. [271] He has already received the missionaries (Elder Dendurent) once, but we have a new special brochure that should interest him. We’d also like to get permission to hold street meetings and to preach in parks, the way missionaries used to do. He should also be interested in the Church’s building program, since he’s known to be a big advocate of development in his city and in the Touraine. This apartment is decidedly better than the ones we had at Rennes—especially as regards to the landlord. M and Mme Bernay are retired, and it seems that they spend half their time doing nice things for us. Last evening, for example, we found a big [272] plate full of hot beignets aux poires (pear fritters) that Mme Berney had made and left on our radiator, so that they’d stay warm.

January 21— Our plans to go visit the Château de Chinon yesterday got frustrated, but in a happy way. We had appointments to keep that really needed to happen yesterday, and duty took precedence over pleasure. It was a good day of work, for we were able to present the… [The journal breaks off here. Its resumption below has benefited by recent Providential serendipity: see the sidebar on the next page.] …first discussion to our kindly Russian gentleman, M Stchékine, and a part of that same discussion to our dental technician, M Péan. We also visited the Castre family, who confirmed their intention to be baptized next Saturday. Having been sent away from the Sanitas neighborhood last week by a grossly snotty concierge, we’re now tracting right downtown. Which seems fortunate from every point of view: on the one hand, Sanitas has been tracted out so frequently, ever since the missionaries came to Tours, that we’re received there with little warmth. On the other hand, the center feels like virgin territory, thus far—everybody seems to have assumed somebody else had already covered it.

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