APF History

The Adventist Peace Fellowship (APF) is a non-profit lay organization that seeks to raise consciousness about the centrality of peacemaking to the beliefs and heritage of Seventh-day Adventists. The APF is not officially affiliated, funded, or controlled by the Seventh-day Adventist Church in any way and does not speak on the Church's behalf.  We welcome Adventists and friends of Adventists to join our network and to add their voices and their talents to the work of peace education and advocacy informed by the values of the Adventist tradition.

The APF emerged in 2001 out of conversations between Ronald Osborn, then a student at the Graduate Institute of St. John's College in Annapolis, and Douglas Morgan, a history professor at Columbia Union College.  Both had long-standing interests in the relation of Adventist faith to matters of peace and social justice and knew many others with similar concerns. They sensed a need to bring these people together in dialogue and to give voice to peacemaking as a central and indispensable dimension of Adventist belief and practice.  These concerns were given new urgency following the terrorist attacks of September 11 later that year.

In 2002, about 20 Adventist scholars, administrators, pastors, and graduate students throughout the United States agreed to be members of an advisory committee for the APF.  In early 2003, a website and e-mail newsletter were launched under Morgan's leadership as director of the APF, providing a wide array of commentary, news, and resources for peace advocacy.  In 2005, the APF published its first book, The Peacemaking Remnant: Essays and Historical Documents, edited by Morgan, which has been used in college level courses as an introduction to the social ethics of Adventism with a particular focus on questions of violence and war.  The APF has also been involved in conferences, demonstrations, and teaching seminars since the organization's founding. These efforts have received numerous expressions of support and gratitude from people around the world. 

In 2003, the APF received 501c3 tax exempt status from the State of Maryland as a non-profit organization.  From its founding, the APF has served as an informal network rather than a highly structured organization. We have no paid staff (although we periodically contract specific jobs to individuals, such as web design and maintenance) and no office but depend on the voluntary efforts of individuals who share a common concern for recovering vital aspects of the Adventist tradition that have been lost.

Between 2011 and 2015, Osborn served as APF director, and in September 2015, another dedicated peacemaker and former APF secretary, Jeff Boyd, took on the directorship role. Our efforts today include an expanded and holistic emphasis on dimensions of peacemaking beyond dilemmas of violence and war, including: care for creation, economic justice, freedom of conscience for persons both inside and outside of the Adventist community, racial and gender equality, and the nexus of health and human rights.  We continue to find startling and creative resources in Scripture and in the Adventist heritage for engaging with our world as peacemakers who share responsibility for the global common good and for the well being of our neighbors regardless of their race, gender, economic status, or religious beliefs.