The Seventh-day Adventist Church maintains a singular international identity by decoupling its mission from the political interests of its American birthplace and resisting the pressures of religious nationalism.
TLDR
The Seventh-day Adventist Church functions as a highly centralized global organization, a structure that is nearly unique within Protestantism. While many denominations operate through loose affiliations, the Adventist Church maintains a singular administrative hierarchy based in Silver Spring, Maryland. This General Conference system ensures that identical beliefs and policies apply in every country. With 94% of its 23.6 million members living outside North America, the church must operate as a neutral international actor. Unlike the Catholic Church, which uses its sovereign state status (the Holy See) to project neutrality, the Adventist Church must actively enforce its own non-alignment from within the United States. Critics who suggest the church should disengage from global bodies like the United Nations often do so through a narrow, nationalistic lens. Such a move would strip the church of its diplomatic shield, endangering believers in restricted regions and abandoning a core commitment to universal religious liberty.
Continue Reading
This article was originally published on Substack. Subscribe to get updates directly to your inbox.