More than 10,000 people were baptized June 23 in what Tanzanian Seventh-day Adventist Church leaders are calling the largest baptism ever in the history of the church in East Africa. More than 40 Adventist pastors from across Africa baptized some 2,800 people at a single site at Lake Victoria, the world’s second-largest fresh water lake. On the same day, more than 7,000 people were baptized at sites around south Nyanza and surrounding regions. Most of those baptized had been prepared by local pastors or had completed Bible study courses, say regional church leaders.

Another baptism for an estimated 1,000 people is planned at Lake Victoria for June 30, reports Steve Bina, secretary of the Adventist Church in Tanzania.

The baptisms come as a satellite evangelistic series, entitled “Africa for Christ 2001,” continues to draw nightly crowds of between five and seven thousand people at a stadium in Mwanza, Tanzania.  The three-week event, which began June 16, is being broadcast by Adventist Global Communication Network across Africa, India, and Europe.