28 June, 2017

ADRA Taps Technology to Provide Water to 1.5 Million

The Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) International announced a new partnership with global water technology leader Grundfos last week, in a move to provide access to clean water to 1.5 million people in Africa, Asia, Central and South America, and South Pacific over the next five years. The partnership aims to improve and save lives by using renewable energy and water innovation technologies that provides more efficient and sustainable water access than more traditional methods.

26 June, 2017

Adventist Institute to Launch Initiative to Reach the Community

You would never guess it by looking at him, but Johnny An, a gentle-spirited nursing student at Weimar Institute, was kicked out of his last school. It wasn’t low grades or bad behavior that forced the only child from Incheon, Korea, out of school. It was just the opposite: his exceptional leadership skills and his commitment to biblical truth got him in trouble. While attending Christian International School in Korea, An was president of the student body and the choir leader. He also began studying the Bible with a pastor at the local Seventh-day Adventist Church, where he learned exciting ideas that he couldn’t keep to himself.

22 June, 2017

First Café Church Opens In New York City

In upper Manhattan, the MyGen Seventh-day Adventist Church recently opened its doors for its first official service. Upon entering the church, it becomes immediately apparent that this is not a conventional church. MyGen church is Greater New York Conference’s first Seventh-day Adventist “café church.” Instead of pews, round tables fill the space and worship is led from a stage platform. The members come dressed formally or informally, the music is lively, the service is interactive, and Sabbath School happens over lunch following the worship service. According to the organizers, that is the goal.

20 June, 2017

Adventists Respond to London Building Fire

The scenes at Grenfell Estate were both horrific and numbing. Grenfell Tower after the fire. Image from Wikimedia Commons It was about 4:30 pm on Wednesday, June 14, almost 14 hours since the start of the fire at the apartment complex in London, and one could still see the smoke and smell the burning as the 24-story block of apartments continued to consume any outward visible structure of the building. The atmosphere was still of amazement, shock and despair as people that were either apartment residents, or those who had to be evacuated nearby, sat along the concrete pavement in dismay. Some were being comforted by other people present in the area, while others were just staring in stark bewilderment.

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

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.

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.