News Briefs for March 2, 2018
News reports from Walla Walla University, Calvert County, Maryland; Pine Forge Academy, Iraq, the Bahamas, Southern Adventist University, Glendale, California; New Zealand and Germany.
From the Upper Columbia Conference of the Adventist Church: On Wednesday, Feb. 28, 2018, a Piper Arrow airplane from the Walla Walla University aviation program went down in the Blue Mountains north of Tollgate, Oregon. The aviation student and the flight instructor walked away from the accident and were in regular contact with rescue personnel. WWU is working with the relevant authorities as they investigate the incident per their routine processes.
The Calvert Recorder reports that an Episcopal Congregation in Calvert County, Maryland has presented in an Adventist Church about the history of slavery in the area. Middleham and St. Peter’s Parish in Lusby, Maryland focused on connections to slavery in their own parish during the February 10 presentation at Emmanuel Seventh-day Adventist Church which is located in the communtiy of St. Leonard. Using church records from Middleham and St. Peter’s Parish, presenters identified specific slaves connected to the parish, revealing conditions and abuses endured by slaves, some of which were owned by the rector of the congregation in the 18th century.
Television station CBS Philly reported that a building on the campus of Pine Forge Academy served as an important stop on the Underground Railroad. The most historic building on the campus of the historically black Adventist school is the Manor House which served as a staging point in the Underground Railroad network of secret routes and safe houses established in America during the early to mid-19th century. The network was used by African-American slaves to escape into free states and Canada.
Hollywood, California-based X-Files screenwriter Benjamin Van Allen revealed in an interview with film and TV industry site Mandy that he studied film at Southern Adventist University. Van Allen’s X-Files episode ‘Familiar’ airs on March 7. His advice for aspiring industry professionals was to cultivate a very strong work ethic and write every day. X-Files is one of the longest-running science fiction series in network TV.
The Rudaw news site based in Iraqi Kurdistan has reported that an Adventist Church is being built in Ainkawa, a predominantly Assyrian suburb outside the city limits of Kurdistan’s Erbil. Rudaw reported that the first Adventist Church in Iraq was opened in 1924 in Baghdad. The church was destroyed and many Christians have since moved to Kurdish regions of Iraq. There are 305 churches in Iraq — 155 of which are located in the Kurdistan Region.
The Bahamas Weekly reported that the island nation’s Governor General Her Excellency Dame Marguerite Pindling attended the Annual Seventh-day Adventist Law Enforcement Church Service at Hillview Seventh-day Adventist Church on Saturday, February 24, 2018. Also in attendance were Commander, Royal Bahamas Defence Force, Commodore Tellis Bethel and Acting Permanent Secretary, Ministry of National Security, Eugene Poitier.
The Chattanoogan reported that Southern Adventist University’s School of Education and Psychology will offer crisis intervention training with certification provided by the International Critical Incident Stress Foundation. Nurses, counselors, social workers, teachers, clergy, law enforcement and other crisis responders are invited to participate. The training will take place from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. at three Sunday sessions: April 8, April 15, and April 22. All three sessions are required for certification. Continuing education credit is available. To register for the event, call 423-236-2492.
The New Zealand Herald has run a story on the origins of cornflakes titled “The ‘sinful’ reason why this breakfast food was created.” The story notes that John Harvey Kellogg created the cereal and marketed it as a “healthy, ready-to-eat anti-masturbatory morning meal.” Kellogg is identified as an Adventist physician who “staunchly believed in celibacy and that sex was unhealthy and immoral.” The story states that Kellogg slept in a different room from his wife and never consummated their marriage, preferring to adopt children.
On April 23–26, Friedensau University in Germany will host a symposium on “Contours of European Adventism.” The event will focus on the history of European Adventism. It will look at how the Adventist movement in Europe has, over the years, renegotiated how it relates to society at large, other religious and cultural communities, as well as its own denominational tradition. Click here for more information or contact: esda@thh-friedensau.de.