The act of caring for people can mean many things: helping with food, clothing, hours of attention, humanitarian aid to refugees, and more. And in many of them, Adventists are present. Since the denomination's birth in the 19th century, this characteristic has been pulsating among its members.
Among these fronts are Adventist Solidarity Action (ASA), Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA), and other institutions that constantly work for the benefit of the community.
ADRA focuses on social projects outside church walls. One of them is assistance in times of disasters, such as torrential rains, floods, and wars, which happen occasionally. Besides this, there are also the permanent projects that care for men, women, children, and others who have been forgotten by society and need support to start over. In the first half of this year alone, 595,154 people were helped in some way.
With the intention of taking care of people's mental health, in 2020, the Friendly Ear project was born. It arose from a pandemic demand for mental health care and was created by the Women's Ministries Department of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in South America. And now, even with life going back to the way it was before, the project is still running. In the last six months, 1,115 free consultations were provided by volunteer psychologists.
If, on the one hand, there are some recent projects, others have already existed for years and are part of Adventists' routine. This is the case of Life for Lives, a blood donation project that mobilized 73,445 donors in eight South American countries. Considering each blood bag potentially saves four lives, almost 300,000 people were able to receive help in a moment of complete vulnerability.
Also trying to mitigate the social effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, ASA extended the Christmas Mutirão project. In addition to collecting donations at the end of the year, Easter has become another occasion to help others. This year, 1,523,003 kilograms of food reached the tables of almost 1 million people.
Emergency Assistance
In March of this year, torrential rains caused destruction and deaths in the city of Petrópolis, in the mountainous region of Rio de Janeiro. Amid the destroyed houses and weeping for the dead, hope for a new beginning also came through the volunteers. Pastor João Custódio, ASA's director in that region, mobilized dozens of people to bring a little comfort to the city's residents.
"It was something very fast, right?" recalls Custódio. In a matter of a few hours, the town was completely under the mud. He says the next day, he was already meeting with a committee that would evaluate the best way to help. He left home thinking he would stay for two or three days, but he stayed fourteen days. They arrived in Petrópolis before lunchtime.
"Facing the calamity situation, we defined a pilot plan," Custódio says. He also explains that they established a path for donors to send resources, registered families, and directed them to the most urgent needs. All this was possible because many people, even if inexperienced in working with disasters, were willing to help.
Water, hot food, food baskets, electrical appliances, furniture, clothes—everything that could be sent to the population arrived through donations at the more than 70 stations set up in Adventist churches in the state. Trucks of water arrived from Espírito Santo, and money came from the church at the Adventist University Center of São Paulo (UNASP), in São Paulo, to buy stoves.
This is a unique situation, but parallel to this, there are the projects that take place in the local churches and are led by ASA. They now total more than 53,000 regional initiatives, and as a result of these people's involvement with Adventists, more than 60,000 are receiving Bible studies.
Beyond the Classrooms
These initiatives do not only come from the church but also from Adventist Education. Beyond teaching, both students and the entity itself are involved in helping people in need. Some examples were the support for flood victims in Rio de Janeiro, with the donation of 17,690 liters of water, and the assistance to victims of a fire in Argentina.
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There is also a systematic habit of donating basic necessities such as food, clothing, and hygiene items. The employees, as well as Adventist youth, are regular blood donors (see data in the infographic). With all these actions, more than 30,000 people who are part of the school community have benefited in some way.
For Pastor Stanley Arco, president of the Adventist Church in eight South American countries, this reflects the main characteristic of Christians, which is the love of neighbors. "I understand that it is intrinsic to those who receive God's love to transmit it to others in various ways, including by supporting those who need it most," he reflects. Arco also highlights that this is encouraged at various levels of the institution and assures that both the organization and local churches are dedicated to alleviating the suffering of people in different areas of life.