Columbia Union News

Frank Hale Jr., PhD, (84) a beloved member of the Allegheny West Conference’s (AWC) Ephesus church in Columbus, Ohio, died last Wednesday after an extended illness.

Don A. Roth, long considered the “PR person” for the Seventh-day Adventist church for the past 60 years and a former Visitor editor, passed away on Tuesday evening at his home in Loma Linda, Calif. “I spent 15 happy years in the Columbia Union Conference,” Roth wrote last year in a letter to the current Visitor editor. “We had a great team at the union office and I thoroughly enjoyed those years.”

This month Ileana Espinosa joins the Columbia Union Conference’s Office of Education as associate director for elementary education. Espinosa hails from the Central California Conference where she served 14 years as associate superintendent. Prior to joining that conference, she taught high school English and Spanish for seven years at Madison Academy (Tenn.). She also taught on the elementary school level. She starts work at the union July 18 and fills the vacancy left when LaVona Gillham retired earlier this year.

The Columbia Union Conference Executive Committee today elected Robert T. Vandeman executive secretary of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in the eight-state, mid-Atlantic region.

At “Engaging Meaningful Ministry From the Margins,” a Fourth Street Friendship church event held last weekend in Washington, D.C., community leaders tackled tough questions about how to reach local communities. Approximately 500 people attended the event, and viewers from as far away as California and Dubai tuned in via the Internet.
 

Takoma Park, MD — The Trustees of Washington Adventist University (WAU) today voted a Memorandum of Understanding with Atlantic Union College (AUC). This MOU calls for the two institutions to work toward an agreement to establish a branch campus of Washington Adventist University at Atlantic Union College in South Lancaster, Massachusetts. WAU would lease the facilities of AUC, and become the sole provider of higher education at the New England location. All provisions are dependent upon approval from the required accrediting and regulatory agencies.

For about 15 years, Shenandoah Valley Adventist Elementary School in New Market, Va., has organized a Senior Citizen Thanksgiving Banquet for grandparents of its students and the community

All things happen in His time. That is what members of the Bryan and Defiance churches were reminded of as they recently merged into a single, new church now known as the Trinity church.

Two members of churches in the Columbia Union Conference, who are also Washington Adventist University alumni, were recently named directors at the North American Division.