Last week, I hunkered down and wrote a letter to Missionary Travel. It was a nice letter - I just wondered if they could explain the visa problem and provide any information at all. Yesterday I received the nicest e-mail from the supervisor in Missionary Travel. The e-mail was very thorough and answered all my questions. Here it is...
Dear Sister VaLene Hulme,
Thank you for your letter dated 22 September 2010. We understand why you would wonder about the status of your son’s visa. Unfortunately it is not possible to notify every parent on the status of their missionary’s visa at any particular time, but please know that you can call our office at any time and we can give you the latest update.
We apologize for the delay in getting your son’s visa to the West Indies and appreciate your patience. I can assure you your son’s visa problems have not fallen through the cracks and been ignored. We are very aware of the situation and doing the best we can to have a solution so these missionaries can get to their fields of labor in a timely manner.
It is not common for the West Indies to have visa problems. However, in May 2010 we were notified that a different type of visa was required for missionaries serving in Suriname. It’s an MKV visa that would allow missionaries to proselyte in the country and not have to leave the country every couple of months and re-enter to be valid on their visa. The first visa we tried on this new method worked just fine (that’s the 1 Elder that received his Visa when your son was ready to leave). However the other ones that were applied for have not received clearance. The Ministry of Justice in Suriname is saying that it has been approved, but the Suriname Embassy here in the states that actually issues the visa hasn’t received the notice of the approval yet. We currently have our Area Legal Counsel in the Caribbean working on the problem. We hope to have a solution very soon!
It is not common to have a missionary serve his entire mission in his temporary assignment. Once a missionary has been delayed for over 6 months, the First Presidency considers reassigning the missionary, but that doesn’t happen very often. We hope to have these visa problems resolved before that happens to your son. But please know that each call to a temporary assignment is prayed about by the Brethren just as their original call is. It’s inspired where they are called to serve.
We appreciate your letter. We are always trying to give the best service to the Lord’s missionaries and their families. Our goal is to get all missionaries to their fields of labor on time and with the appropriate type of visa to be able to perform missionary work.
We hope your missionary is having a wonderful experience serving the Lord in the Alabama Birmingham Mission. We’ll continue doing our best to get him to Suriname as quickly as possible.
Kind regards,
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