Connecting Columbia Union Seventh-day Adventists

Potomac Conference

Like many Americans, Sylvia Urrutia and Anissa Pérez, members of Potomac Conference’s Arise Hispanic-American Company in Silver Spring, Md., felt emotionally drained the past few weeks, watching families be torn apart on the U.S./Mexico border while trying to enter the country. Now they are doing something.

Potomac Conference Prison Ministries leaders Moises Escalera, Hispanic Affairs coordinator; Ryland Holmes, Family, Re-entry and Video Conferencing coordinator; Hector Cruz, senior coordinator; and John Carmouche, coordinator, stand in a video-conferencing room that allows families and inmates to communicate.

The Potomac Conference Alexandria Spanish and Fredericksburg congregations in Virginia are currently connected to 18 Virginia Department of Corrections prisons, offering what possibly no other Adventist church in the world does—video conferencing to unite inmates with their loved ones.

Members from Chesapeake Conference’s Atholton church—Sarah and Anna Singalla, Janet Keng Asare, Pastor Shawn Paris, Jasmin Elliott and Jair Parada—were photographed by Brian Patrick Tagalog in Columbia, Md.

Seventh-day Adventists are among the most racially and ethnically diverse American religious groups. A groundbreaking survey Monte Sahlin conducted also confirmed that Adventism is not only browning but also graying. How will these demographic shifts impact how we minister in our communities?