Mission experts and directors from the church's Global Mission religious study centers met Dec. 5 to 7 in Sau Paulo, Brazil, to share reports and discuss future directions for Adventist relations with other religions around the world.
Seventh-day Adventists are committed to reaching out to other faith communities. Mission experts and directors from the church’s Global Mission religious study centers met Dec. 5 to 7 in Sau Paulo, Brazil, to share reports and discuss future directions for Adventist relations with other religions around the world.
A focus of the meeting was Adventist interaction with Jewish people, and included a visit from Rabbi Henry Sobel, of the Congregacao Israelita Paulista, the largest synagogue in Brazil. Sobel, widely regarded as the unofficial leader of Brazilian Jewry, emphasized the need for continuing dialog between different religious groups. The group visited Sobel’s synagogue for services celebrating the end of the Jewish festival of Hannukah.
On Sabbath, or Saturday, the day Adventists keep holy, the study center group worshiped at the Beth B’nei Tsion Jewish Adventist temple, where the liturgy of the Seventh-day Adventist congregation parallels that of Jewish services. The group then visited an Adventist church where services are specially designed to reach out to the Arab and Muslim community.
Global Mission religious study centers explore ways of reaching out to the Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist and secular communities. “They were created for the purpose of experimenting with ways to better understand and communicate with adherents of other world religions,” says Mike Ryan, director of Global Mission. “The primary question we ask of the study center directors is, ‘Do we have models of bridge-building that are being implemented around the world?’ They have the job of producing resources, as well as building awareness among church members of what they are doing.”
For more information about Global Mission and its religious study centers, visit www.global-mission.org.
