By AdventistNews@gc.adventist.org (Jhenifer Costa)

Does a couple that exercises together stay together? That’s what Odailson and Ellen Fonseca, married for 20 years and parents of preteen Thalissa, believe. Odailson is director of communication and religious liberty for the Adventist Church in São Paulo and Ellen is an elementary school teacher at the Adventist College of Artur Nogueira , in the interior of São Paulo.
Since they began dating, both have maintained an exercise routine and living together has allowed them to practice various…

Source:: sda website

By AdventistNews@gc.adventist.org (Cwayita Madala, Southern Africa-Indian Ocean Division)

Over the last couple of months, I’ve experienced more deaths in my life than ever before. Two of my cousins and two people I looked up to for years died. In addition to this, two loved ones had miscarriages. The grief brought on by these deaths came with a reminder of my own mortality. It made me reflect on my understanding and feelings around death and how that affects how I live.
As humans, we can be very dismissive of death. Death as a topic of discussion is taboo–especially the discussion…

Source:: sda website

By AdventistNews@gc.adventist.org (Office of Adventist Mission)

Adventist churches around the world are being asked to collect a special COVID-19 offering on July 11 to support communities devastated by the pandemic. Funds raised by local churches will be used to help respond within their region of the world.
This means that all COVID-19 Response offerings given by church members will go to their local division and local fields to fund initiatives to help those suffering from this pandemic. Masks. Essential supplies. Counseling . . . Whatever it takes.
…

Source:: sda website

By AdventistNews@gc.adventist.org (Rosmery Sánchez)

Despite massive infections of the COVID-19 virus affecting 190 of its 245 employees, the Ana Stahl Adventist Clinic (Clínica Adventista Ana Stahl in Spanish) in Iquitos, Peru, is back in operation.
Substitute workers from Lima, Peru’s capital some 745 miles away, and doctors from Cuba came to the 94-year-old hospital at the gateway to Peru’s Amazon region to help while many regular staffers were ill. Reports indicated 80 percent of the population of Iquitos had contracted the new coronavirus,…

Source:: sda website

By AdventistNews@gc.adventist.org (AdventHealth)

About a year into his job as a chaplain at AdventHealth Orlando in central Florida, Jamie Ricketts, a native of Alberta, Canada, encountered something none of his training prepared him for: a global pandemic had reached the community he serves.
“Who could have imagined something like this happening?” Ricketts said. “The impact is so unprecedented it requires us to innovate as we work.”
Worldwide, according to data released June 8* by Johns Hopkins University, more than 7 million people have…

Source:: sda website

By AdventistNews@gc.adventist.org (Rafael Brondani)

The simple actions of an 8-year-old girl in the central Brazilian city of Planaltina won the hearts of healthcare workers and first responders. Challenged by speakers at an online youth camp organized by the Seventh-day Adventist Church in the Federal District, little Maria Eduarda decided to honor healthcare workers with greeting cards sent to employees of the area’s Mobile Emergency Care System known as Samu.
Shaped like a heart, the cards read: “Thank you, angels from the health area! May…

Source:: sda website

By AdventistNews@gc.adventist.org (Chrissye Bettoni)

Children whose first memories of life involve deprivation, abuse, and sorrow are finding refuge, healing, and hope at “Welcome Children” centers across Brazil. The centers, called “Casas de Acolhimento” in Portuguese, are sponsored by ADRA Brazil, the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s relief and development arm.
From a very young age, Juliana do Rosário experienced the life of an abused child. She was sexually abused by her mother and stepfather when living with them. Relocation to her biological…

Source:: sda website

By AdventistNews@gc.adventist.org (Daniel Gonçalves, with the collaboration of Jônatas de Souza Goular)

Homeless people in the city of Lages, the largest city in the mountainous region of Brazil’s Santa Catarina state, received food and encouragement from Seventh-day Adventist youths on the evening of May 30. Seventeen young adults from the city’s Central Seventh-day Adventist Church participated, first visiting a temporary shelter managed by city officials. The shelter is designed to help protect the homeless from extreme cold temperatures and other conditions.
The young people distributed 33…

Source:: sda website

By AdventistNews@gc.adventist.org (South-Western Angolan Union)

What happens when a global pandemic blocks the distribution of printed Seventh-day Adventist literature? In Angola, a nation on Africa’s west coast, books are offered digitally, with unexpected results.
For Seventh-day Adventists, sharing the “book of the year,” in this case Hope Beyond Tomorrow by evangelist Mark Finley is a traditional means of bringing the gospel message to many who might not be receptive to a Bible study invitation or another approach. When a lockdown was imposed, leaders…

Source:: sda website

By AdventistNews@gc.adventist.org (EUDnews. C. Cozzi)

During the last weekend of May 29-June 1, 2020, the second International Adventist Congress for the Deaf and Deaf-blind was anticipated by a large number of European Deaf Seventh-day Adventists. The first event, held in Seville, in 2016, had been successfully considered and many were looking forward to the second congress in 2020.
But the Congress was not exempt from the restrictions lockdowns attributed to the global coronavirus pandemic. Even though many were willing to attend the event, it…

Source:: sda website