Editor’s Choice: 3 Favorite Interviews from 2019
For more than a decade, the Spectrum Interviews section has been publishing interviews with Adventists doing interesting things, from authors and musicians, to app creators and social network developers — from pastors and teachers, to missionaries and philosophers. In this space, our readers find unedited insights into the ideas of all kinds of different people working to improve and change our church and our society.
In 2019 we shared interviews with the presidents of AdventHealth, ADRA, and the Loma Linda Broadcasting Network, as well as interviews with teens and twentysomethings.
In this year-end round-up, Interviews Editor Alita Byrd shares three of her favorites that gave her new perspectives on the culture of Adventists.
Nine-Year-Old Author Shares the Story of Her Books
In the first interview we published in 2019, I talked to nine-year-old Emily Bastien who told us about her second book, a short story collection called The Fearless Fantabulous Five. Emily's confidence and enthusiasm and faith are infectious!
The Tale of Three Tenured Black Male Seventh-day Adventist Professors
In a three-way interview in May with Adventist professors who teach at non-Adventist universities, Sydney Freeman, André Denham, and Ty Douglas reflected on their time at Oakwood and how they have reached this point in their careers. They talked about the advantages and disadvantages of Adventist education. They talked about how their stories are a counter-narrative to many commonly held misconceptions about Black people.
Prone to Wander — a Book for Believers and Doubters Both
I really enjoyed my conversation with prolific author Trudy J. Morgan-Cole, who told us about her new novel Prone to Wander. The book is about five friends who are classmates at an Adventist high school in Canada, and then follows them as they (and their faith) scatters. While the story is a work of fiction, Morgan-Cole told us that: “the broader, over-arching story is absolutely true: I grew up as an Adventist kid with a bunch of church friends, and life took us in very different directions, and we all have different relationships today to the faith that we were raised in. Some are deeply committed and active in the church; some have left it behind entirely. I've used fictional characters to explore something that’s very true for me and a lot of people.”
We look forward to providing you with more exclusive interviews in 2020. If you’ve appreciated our interviews this year, please consider supporting us with a year-end donation. As a non-profit organization, every gift makes a difference.
Thank you, and Happy New Year!
Main image credit: SpectrumMagazine.org. All in-line images courtesy of the interviewees.
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