“Thank you for paying attention to our country, which is small and poor,” Ambassador Sereywath Ek, Cambodia’s ambassador to the United States, told leaders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church during a recent visit to the church’s world headquarters.

He expressed appreciation for the interest of the church and its humanitarian agency, the Adventist Development and Relief Agency, or ADRA, in his country, which suffered 21 years of civil war and a genocide under the Khmer Rouge.

Ambassador Ek’s remarks came at a formal luncheon during his visit. Earlier, he met privately with Pastor Jan Paulsen, world church president, and Dr. John Graz, Public Affairs and Religious Liberty director for the world church. The luncheon included representatives of the church’s presidential, treasury and secretariat offices, as well as several departments.

“We are a spiritual community, a community of faith,” Pastor Paulsen said, adding, “we have been very deliberate to come to people [and try to] make a contribution in terms of education, health and nation building. We hope to be worthy servants of the people.”

Ambassador Ek expressed great interest in the health and education ministries of the Adventist Church, and was grateful for programs such as the tobacco-cessation effort undertaken at many Buddhist temples, or wats, in Cambodia.  He stressed that religious freedom is “complete” for people in the country, and that moral teaching is welcome.

The Seventh-day Adventist Church is active in more than 200 countries around the world, and sponsors numerous health and education projects in Cambodia.