Adventist evangelist and civil rights advocate E.E. Cleveland dies

Edward Earl Cleveland, 88, died yesterday at Huntsville Hospital in Huntsville, Alabama. Cleveland served as associate secretary for the Ministerial Association of the Seventh-day Adventist Church for 23 years. He was a life-long civil rights advocate and evangelist. [photo: Oakwood University]

Adventist Church in Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay moves toward self-administration

Graphic by Megan Brauner

The arrangement would allow each of the three countries to better reach their full potential for growth, church leaders said.

"When you have three different countries under one administration, although you may try to be equally supportive to all three, it is difficult to do it because of customs and distance," said Magdiel Perez Shulz, assistant to the president of the church in South America.

Adventist church membership in Argentina is over 60,000, Paraguay has a little more than 14,000 members and Uruguay has nearly 7,000.

Uruguay has the highest percentage of non-Catholic religions between the three countries at just over 50 percent. Both Argentina and Paraguay are roughly 90 percent Catholic. Argentina is the largest country, followed by Paraguay. Uruguay is the second smallest country on the continent, just ahead of Suriname and slightly smaller than the U.S. state of Washington.

The Austral Union is currently the only church region in South America not organized by countries.

The official reorganization will be voted on during year-end world church business meetings this October, authorizing the South American region to launch the two additional sections, called unions, in January 2010.

Delegates at the world church business meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, will take a final vote to approve the new organization structure in June 2010.

First Adventist college in North Brazil opens

With the official launch last week of the first Seventh-day Adventist college in North Brazil, church leaders hope the region's educational infrastructure will soon match explosive local membership growth in recent years.

The Adventist Church's first college in northern Brazil will open its doors to theology students next semester, offering young people the option of local, church-run education. Church officials and school administration met on campus last week to celebrate the school's launch. [photos: Volnei Porto/ANN]

The Adventist Amazon College's 300-acre campus in the northern coastal region of Brazil is still under construction, but school administrators on site for opening ceremonies August 16 said classes are slated to begin next semester.

Church officials said the college will offer students in northern Brazil the opportunity to study at a local Adventist school and hope graduates will stay in the region where membership continues to outpace church resources and leadership. In some places, pastors oversee dozens of churches.

The college will open its doors to an estimated 55 theology students in February 2010, later expanding to offer additional areas of study, including education and business administration, church leaders said.

"There's a huge need for a college in North Brazil because of the growth of the church in that region," says Luis A. Schulz, assistant director for Education at world church headquarters. "What this school can accomplish for the mission of the church -- in training local young people in ministry and education -- is incredible."

The church region spanning northern Brazil accounts for nearly half of the country's landmass and some 350,000 Adventists.

Currently, students seeking an Adventist higher education in North Brazil travel to São Paulo, more than 2,000 miles away. Church officials say many students instead enroll in local public schools, where training in theology isn't an option.

A dining hall is among the completed buildings on campus. A library, residence hall and church are still in progress.

"Young people in North Brazil will benefit from the opportunity of professional, local training in ministry that this new college will provide," Marlinton Lopes, Adventist Church president for northern Brazil, told South American church communication officials after the ceremony.

Once the $16.5-million campus is completed, school administration anticipates an enrollment of more than 1,500 students. The main entrance, cafeteria, classroom building, chapel and a residence hall are already built, Schulz says, but construction continues on a library, church, an additional dormitory and houses for faculty and staff.

'Video missionaries' to film reality show on medical workers

Adventist-run Hope Channel and Southern Adventist University are teaming up to send video student missionaries to the African country of Lesotho to film a documentary for one year. The student missionaries, from left: Derek Taylor, Carolyn Taylor and Xavier Hazen. [photo courtesy Hope Channel]

The video project features the lives of two medical missionary families, plus the experiences of the videographers themselves.
 

The new reality series is sponsored by the Hope Channel, the Seventh-day Adventist Church's television network, and will run for 13 episodes.

"I'd like to bring to the screen the things God is doing in Lesotho, and put a face on the reality of medical missionary work through the families we're filming," said Derek Taylor, a junior film production major at Southern and current video student missionary.
 

The video student missionary program is a collaborative effort of Hope Channel and Southern Adventist University, located in Collegedale, Tennessee, United States. During their assignment, students will shadow medical personnel working at Maluti Adventist Hospital in Lesotho.

Taylor and two fellow students, Carolyn Taylor and Xavier Hazen, left for Lesotho in July. Carolyn Taylor is a biology major whose tasks, she said, include creating storylines for the episodes and appearing on camera. Hazen, a graphic design major, said he plans to help with production as well as design.

The three-person crew plans to wrap up the series in summer 2010.