One of the joys of working as part of the news team at the 58th business session of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, here in St Louis, is the privilege of wearing the badge.
One of the joys of working as part of the news team at the 58th business session of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, here in St Louis, is the privilege of wearing the badge. Bright red, with the word “Press” in prominent letters, the badge is my ticket into all sorts of places around the Edward Jones Dome and America’s Center.
Don’t get me wrong; the security guards are very vigilant. If you don’t have a green badge, in addition to the red one, you won’t get anywhere. And your green badge has to have the right letters on it, because admission to many areas is selective—if you don’t have the right letters you can’t get in.
Well I’ve got all the right letters, and, I’ve got my press badge. The press badge is special because it gives you permission to talk to people. I know you can talk to people anyway—people are doing it all the time, but with the press badge I can be ... well, intrusive.
A few days ago I was standing in the lobby area of the main entrance to the Edward Jones Dome, gathering “vox pops” for a story I was writing. By the way, “vox pops” is shorthand for “vox populi,” or the “voice of the people,” in case you didn’t know.
The technique is basically this: you look around for someone who looks like they speak your language, English in my case, and who looks as if they are not in too much of a hurry. But it’s not quite that simple because your collection of vox pops needs to be representative. You have to get a balance of age, gender and ethnicity.
For my particular question I was looking for someone from Africa. Mercifully all guests and delegates have badges that specify the region of the world they come from, and I soon spotted the words I wanted to see: “West-Central Africa Division”.
“Hello,” I said. “May I ask you a few questions?”
“I know your father,” came the reply.
Now, at this point I need to explain something: When you are part of the Adventist church family you get to know a whole load of people. If you are a minister in the church, then you get to know even more. So, as a minister, who is also the son of a minister, I am well connected and I wasn’t particularly surprised by this response. What is remarkable though, is that it was actually 40 years ago that the man I was speaking to, John Nengel, knew my father. This was a real blast from the past.
As a child I had lived in East Nigeria where my father taught an Adventist school and served as the pastor of the local church. John, now Dr. John Nengel, professor of history at the University of Jos, had been one of my dad’s students. Forty years later he still remembered him, and even remembered that he had two small boys. It was a great reunion when we met up.
This isn’t a news story. This kind of encounter is happening thousands of times every day here in St Louis, as Adventists who have traveled from all corners of the globe meet up with people they know from way back. You can just stand and watch it happening. The excited expressions, warm embraces, and animated conversations.
If you watch for long enough you’ll also pick up a few people getting it wrong. Weren’t you in Canada back in the 60s? No I don’t believe I was. But isn’t your brother Richard? Well, no. My brother is Bill. Oh, I’m sorry. I guess I’ve made a mistake.
But in a church community where many still refer each other as “brother” or “sister,” there’s no embarrassment. One answer will smooth things over: It’s okay, I know your Father.
Views expressed in this column do not necessarily reflect those of Adventist News Network or the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
