FATIHA BENAZZA: [Offered prayer.]
HAROLD W. BAPTISTE: Today we have the final presentation in the Pro?ling Adventist Leadership series, and the subject today is "Pro?ling Adventist Leadership: Responsiveness to Diversity." Our presenter is Dr. Leslie Pollard. He serves as vice president for diversity at Loma Linda University Adventist Health Sciences Center. Dr. Pollard has pursued a broad education: he holds a bachelor's degree from Oakwood College, a Master of Divinity from Andrews University Theology Seminary, and a Doctor of Ministry in preaching with worship from Claremont School of Theology. In June 2004 he graduated with a Master of Business of Administration from La Sierra University's School of Business. He is now completing a dissertation for a Ph.D. in New Testament studies. He has published articles regularly in church publications; he is the author of a groundbreaking book, Embracing Our Diversity: How to Understand and Reach People From All Cultures, published by Review and Herald Publishing Association. This work, which explores the relationship between leadership and cultural competency, has been published in French, German, and Spanish. Dr. Pollard has been married for 26 years to his college sweetheart, Prudence LaBeech, also a graduate of Oakwood College; and she holds a Master of Public Health from the University of Michigan and a Doctor of Philosophy in evaluation measurement and research design, specializing in executive leadership development.
The Pollards have two daughters: one is a law student at Mercer University; the other, a sophomore at Oakwood College. They make their home in Riverside, California. Dr. Pollard, we are glad to have you here; please share with us what the Lord has blessed you with.
LESLIE N. POLLARD: [Presented his paper "Responsiveness to Embracing Diversity," which can be found in Pro?ling Adventist Leadership, the booklet prepared for this symposium.]
HAROLD W. BAPTISTE: Thank you very much, Dr. Pollard. He has selected a panel to work with this morning, and at this time he'll introduce that panel.
LESLIE N. POLLARD: Thank you. And we will keep this very brief. To your left is a dear friend of mine, Dr. Ernie Castillo, from the Paci?c Union Conference in the North American Division. Dr. Castillo is a Hispanic by family of origin. He has led effectively in the Paci?c Union, and his leadership is deeply, deeply appreciated.
Sitting next to him is Mrs. Nicole Brise, women's ministries director for the Southeastern Conference in Florida. She is an outstanding person of Haitian extraction; she is bilingual and has done leadership and cross-cultural ministry all of her ministry, and we appreciate her leadership and her presence this morning.
Seated next to Mrs. Brise is Dr. Jon Dybdahl. Dr. Dybdahl is the son of a family of immigrants. He is president of Walla Walla College. He has been the director of the Institute of World Mission at Andrews University and is very ?uent in the issues of cross-cultural competency.
ERNEST CASTILLO: Mr. Chairman, I want to thank Dr. Pollard for this excellent presentation on diversity. I come from the Paci?c Union Conference, where every Sabbath the gospel of Jesus Christ is preached in about 35 different languages. We have within the Paci?c Union Conference territory hundreds of different people groups. When I look at the Los Angeles area, the San Francisco area, the Honolulu area, we can safely say this morning that the mission ?eld has come to us. Out of our 700-plus churches within the Paci?c Union territory about 80 percent of those churches are what we would call multicultural churches.
NICOLE BRISE: Mr. Pollard, I really appreciate the presentation today. Diversity is a need in our territory. In my conference we have 130 churches, and 15 nationalities in those 130 churches. We speak different languages, and our children create a subculture because they too come from another culture and are not a part of this culture. So it's a great need in our society that we understand that we must be Jesus-centered so that we can reach other people to turn them to Jesus no matter what our nationality is.
JON DYBDAHL: I really appreciate, Dr. Pollard, your emphasis on training. I think that's absolutely vital. Many do not understand the importance of sensitivity. I spent many years helping to train missionaries, and while many of them were eager to learn about other cultures, there always were a number who said that they had had experience in this area. We had to say, over and over, that sensitivity is important. It comes with training. It comes with mentoring. It comes with understanding your own differences and biases, and I think that not just the missionaries who go cross-cultur-ally need this kind of training-but all of us who work in a very multicultural church and a multicultural world need this kind of training to make us sensitive-loving followers of the Lord.
HAROLD W. BAPTISTE: Thank you. We have time for a few questions.
NEVILLE HARCOMBE: I've appreciated the pro?ling of Adventist Leadership every day. I think it's most important that we address these issues in the Adventist Church. When it comes to the Seventh-day Adventist Church, membership and also fellowship are important. However, we restrict our membership to certain differences or diversities. For instance, we do not allow alcoholics; we don't allow those who are hooked on drugs. Fellowship in the Adventist Church is open to all differ-ences-for example, homosexuals; those addicted to drugs or alcohol.
Through fellowship they have opportunities to become members by the transforming grace of the Holy Spirit. And so my point is that even though membership prohibits certain diversities, the church in fellowship is open to all sinners.
HAROLD W. BAPTISTE: Thank you very much.
KEITH MATTINGLY: Andrews University takes very seriously Dr. Pollard's excellent suggestion to get into diversity training and to include it in our general education program. We accept your challenge there and applaud you.
I do have one area of the diversity issue that concerns me. I am the chairman of the Religion Department, and I've had many females sitting in my of?ce who share with me, very clearly, a sense of calling to ministry that is better than that of their male counterparts, and they share a frustration with me often. They hear good words from our church leadership relative to their gender, but they don't experience the concomitant application of words into action. And a couple days ago I heard a sister from Africa who was expressing here on the ?oor her concern for how dif?cult the leadership in the church has made it for women to conduct ministry in her country.
Facing this tremendous need of workers to engage in evangelism, Ellen White chose not to enter into theological debate over gender requirements. In fact, she reminds us that the Spirit of God prepares both men and women to be pastors in the church, and we have also been reminded at this meeting that the words pastor and minister are applied by her equally throughout the Spirit of Prophecy. We speak words, but we need to get to the place where we change our words into actions. I know that my words will be interpreted in various ways, but my plea here is to be sensitive to gender issues.
HAROLD W. BAPTISTE: Thank you very much.
BRICE SAINTIL: This is a very good topic, because most of the time we as leaders fail because we confuse unity and uniformity. We are different people from different classes with different intellectual backgrounds. We need to pay attention to diversity.
I would like to talk about love, patience, kindness, goodness, self-control, empathy, and communication skills. Sometimes we as leaders tend to talk, to communicate our priorities, but we don't have time to listen to other people. Communication is not a one-way street.
HAROLD W. BAPTISTE: Thank you very much. We have a number of names still on the screen, but our time has expired. I want to express appreciation to Dr. Pollard again for this presentation.
PETER ROENNFELDT: [Benediction.]
HAROLD W. BAPTISTE, Chair
BILL BOTHE, ATHAL TOLHURST,
FRED THOMAS, and CLAUDE
SABOT, Proceedings Editors
