Pan-European Adventist Youth Congress Planned

Thousands of Seventh-day Adventist young people are expected to participate in a Pan-European Youth Congress in Wroclaw, Poland, Aug. 4 to 8, 2004. Referred to as the “first youth congress of the millennium,” the event will be co-sponsored by the two European divisions of the Adventist Church. “A youth congress is always a never-to-be-forgotten experience, and this will certainly be the case in 2004,” said Bertil Wiklander, president of the church’s Trans-European region, where the event will take place. [Miroslav Pujic/ANN]

Adventist Conscientious Objector Noted

Desmond Doss, a Seventh-day Adventist who received the United States Congressional Medal of Honor, the highest American award for military honor, was one of four conscientious objectors featured in a report by the British Broadcasting Corporation May 15, International Conscientious Objectors’ Day. Doss, the only non-combatant ever to be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, was presented the award by American President Harry S. Truman on Oct. 12, 1945, for saving the lives of 75 of his fellow men—carrying them one by one to safety while suffering wounds himself. Private Doss served as an army medic and, as a devout Adventist, refused to carry weapons or work on Saturday, the day of worship for Adventists, in accordance to his beliefs. [Julio Munoz/ANN]