November 9, 2007

La Sierra University’s annual Stahl Center Sabbath, held October 27, 2007, celebrated the university’s diversity and highlighted the university’s global service orientation.

Highlighting this annual liturgical service is a colorful processional of students in national dress bearing ceramic candleholders thrown from clay obtained from such diverse Christian mission locales as Peru's Lake Titicaca Basin to the Sinai Desert. These are followed by students bearing artifacts from around the globe, tiles created by community members for the university's Path of the Just, and hand-made infant quilts. The quilts are remnants of fully 20,000 quilts delivered to AIDS babies and other displaced children from around the globe at venues ranging from the maternity wards of women's prisons in Thailand, Catholic AIDS hospices on the shores of the Brazilian Amazon, and orphanages in Romania.

The day's homily, "Freedom—Discovered in 'The Other' "—this year was delivered by Pastor Carl Wilkens, former Director of Adventist Development and Relief Services (ADRA) in Rwanda. Wilkens has received numerous awards for his refusal to follow orders to evacuate in the midst of violent and murderous times, but rather remaining with orphans and other school children and offering his presence as a source of protection and hope.

This day of remembrance also include a number of student reports of their local, national, and international service activities.

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PR Contact: Larry Becker
Executive Director of University Relations
La Sierra University
Riverside, California
951.785.2460 (voice)