Columbia Union News

David Dildy, an executive committee member from the Potomac Conference, speaks during the November Columbia Union Conference Executive Committee Meeting

At its year-end meeting in November, members of the Columbia Union Conference Executive Committee discussed at length the General Conference Unity in Mission document voted at Annual Council in early October. Many expressed concern about the intent, purpose and assumptions of the document, how it was processed, why it is needed, how it will impact the mission of the church in this region and what will be the consequences of non-compliance.

Story by WAU Communication Staff

An Honors College will be launched next year at Washington Adventist University (WAU) to further enhance its academic offerings and move the university another step closer to achieving the Vision 2020 – Growing with Excellence plan that seeks to attain excellence at all levels of the institution. This will be the first Honors College in the Seventh-day Adventist system of higher education.

Story by Edwin Manuel Garcia

Before he saved dozens of wounded soldiers on the front lines during World War II, which earned him a Medal of Honor, Seventh-day Adventist combat medic Desmond Doss (pictured below with President Harry Truman) was called a misfit for refusing to carry a weapon, and commanders ostracized him for observing the Sabbath.

Life wasn’t easy for Doss and other Adventists in the U.S. armed forces.

But 70 years later, the military has become a more welcoming institution for Adventists, according to active and retired military personnel within the Columbia Union. This is a marked change from when Doss enlisted as a noncombatant with conscientious objector status.