13 June, 2017

Papua New Guinea Backs Down on Sabbath Voting

Electoral officials in Papua New Guinea (PNG) have made changes to the upcoming general election to ensure no Christian will have to vote on their day of worship. After the announcement was made that polling would run from June 24 to July 8, a concerned Kepsie Elodo, president of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in PNG, wrote to the Chief Electoral Commissioner noting that these dates included three Saturdays. For Seventh-day Adventists, Saturday is the seventh-day Sabbath that, following Bible commands, church members keep as holy (Exodus 20:8-11.)

12 June, 2017

Bangladesh Adventists Celebrate World No Tobacco Day

With growing governmental concern over tobacco use, the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Bangladesh responded with a health rally on May 31—a day designated as World No Tobacco Day—as part of its ongoing community health efforts. Government reports in Bangladesh indicate more than 40 percent of its residents use tobacco products, and the number is rising. Alarmingly, the Smokeless Tobacco and Public Health: A Global Perspective report released in 2014 by the Center for Disease Control noted that Bangladesh and India are home to 80 percent of the world’s smokeless tobacco users.

12 June, 2017

More Adventist Winners in World Cookbook Awards

A book on red meat’s impact on health and the environment, which includes the work of two Adventist dietitians, won first prize in in its category at this year’s Gourmand World Cookbook Awards. Carol Zeuschner, from the Sydney Adventist Hospital, and Angela Saunders, from Sanitarium Health and Wellbeing, together with Kate Marsh, from the Northside Nutrition Clinic in Sydney, wrote a chapter in a 400-page reference book entitled Impact of Meat Consumption on Health and Environmental Sustainability, which was produced by Curtin University in Western Australia.

9 June, 2017

Voices Are Raised for Freedom at the 15th Annual Religious Liberty Dinner

More than 150 diplomats, religious liberty advocates, and guests gathered on June 1 for the 15th annual Religious Liberty Dinner held in the Religious Freedom Center of the Newseum Institute in Washington, D.C. The annual event is held to celebrate and bring attention to a central human right: the freedom of religion or belief. U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Dr. Ben Carson, delivered the keynote. During his address, Carson made the clear distinction between simply being free to worship and being free to exercise religion not only in the public sphere, but in private businesses and institutions. Carson praised the United States’ stance on religious liberty.

8 June, 2017

New Upcoming Children’s Television Program Teaches About the Human Body

Final filming of a new children’s television series called Cataplum wrapped up at Montemorelos University’s UMedia Center last month. The series will soon air on UMTv, the university’s television channel, as well as Hope Channel Inter-America’s Esperanza TV. Each 28-minute episode of Cataplum features children ages of 6 to 11 playing and learning of God’s marvelous creation of the human body.

8 June, 2017

My Father Left Church Over Blue Jeans

My father grew up in a Seventh-day Adventist home in Puerto Rico, but he left the church when someone criticized his fiancée for wearing blue jeans to church. My father was 19 at the time, and he showed up on Sabbath with my future mother, who belonged to a Sunday-keeping denomination. My father grew furious when someone told my mother that she wasn’t dressed appropriately, and he abandoned his faith.

7 June, 2017

Why Should We Care About the Reformation?

Dozens of religious freedom scholars, advocates, and supporters met on June 1 at the Washington D.C. Religious Freedom Center to commemorate and discuss the implications of the Protestant Reformation for religious liberty and freedom of conscience. The one-day event, themed “Commemoration of the 500-year Anniversary of the 16th Century Protestant Reformation: Conversations on the Reformation, Christian Identities, and Freedom of Conscience,” sought to delve into the multiple connections between the watershed 16th-century event and our ongoing contemporary quest for freedom of conscience and worship.

5 June, 2017

In Panama, Adventist Pastor Remembers Ministering to Former General Manuel Noriega

From the moment he found out that General Manuel Noriega, a former military dictator in Panama serving a sentence in France, was going to be extradited back to Panama in 2011, Seventh-day Adventist Pastor Jose Daniel Sánchez knew he wanted to meet him. Noriega, who died in prison at 83 last week, was captured when the United States invaded Panama in 1989, and sentenced him to prison for drug trafficking, money laundering, and other charges. Noriega served 17 years in the Federal Correction Institution in Miami until 2007, then served a sentence in France, and was serving a two-term 20-year sentence for money laundering and the murders of his opponents in Panama.

2 June, 2017

In Puerto Rico, Homeless Wash Feet for First Time

A group of church members gathered in a Puerto Rican park at 5 a.m. Sabbath to pray, read the Bible, and eat a light breakfast. Little did they expect to watched by homeless people when they were ejected from their usual spot and met in the city’s central square instead. The one-off move, however, changed their meetings permanently. Their monthly gathering has transformed into a weekly worship and breakfast for the homeless that culminated in a special communion service with grape juice, bread, and foot washing.

1 June, 2017

Seventh-day Adventists in the Southern Philippines assist Marawi city evacuees displaced by militant fighting

Adventist groups are assisting evacuees displaced from the Philippines’ largest Muslim city of Marawi during militant fighting in the southern Philippines this past week. Members of a militant group called the Maute invaded the city in response to a failed military attempt to capture the group’s pro-Isis leader on May 23. They took over a government hospital and burned a private Christian college and the city jail prompting Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte to declare martial law in the island of Mindanao.

30 May, 2017

At 95, Maranatha Founder John Freeman Passes to His Rest

John Dodd Freeman, the founder of Maranatha Volunteers International, a charitable organization and a supporting ministry of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, passed to his rest on May 22 in Salem, Oregon. He was 95. “It takes a special kind of person to begin something—to take an idea and bring it to life,” said Don Noble, current president of Maranatha Volunteers International. “That’s who John Freeman was.”

30 May, 2017

In Jamaica, Bus and Taxi Drivers Get Free Health Screenings

Scores of bus and taxi drivers were the beneficiaries of free health check-up last weekend, during a “Know Your Numbers” health drive organized by the Three Angels Pharmacy with support from members of some local Seventh-day Adventist Churches, health agencies and companies in Mandeville, Jamaica. Two hundred and forty of the approximately 400 persons registered were bus and taxi drivers who received the opportunity to be tested for Body Mass Index (BPI), blood glucose, cholesterol, blood pressure, eye and HIV, on May 27-28, 2017. Healthy lifestyle and general counseling along with prayers for those who requested it were also done. A volunteer medical doctor was also available.