"Prevention & Democracy Promotion", was the main topic of the 24th German Prevention Day on May 20 and 21 in Berlin. In the exhibition accompanying the congress the Seventh-Day Adventist Church was again represented with an information stand among the 171 participating organizations.
Break the silence about violence
The Women’s Ministries Department of the church informed about the worldwide project enditnow - Stop silence about violence", which is an ongoing project since 2009 together with Adventist Development and Disaster Relief ADRA. The Theological College of the Seventh-day Adventists in Friedensau near Magdeburg is also committed to the topics of prevention and intervention in the various social manifestations of violence in the departments of Christian Welfare and Theology, said Angelika Pfaller, head of the Women’s Ministries department in Germany. Each individual is called to awareness, to condemn all forms of violence, to break the silence, to seek solutions, and to work to end physical, mental and sexual violence.
Advisory Board
In 2010, the Seventh-day Adventist Church founded the advisory board "Facing Sexual Violence". According to Angelika Pfaller, this board deals with all occurring cases of sexual abuse and sexual violence in connection with minors within the Seventh-day Adventist Chrch in Germany. The Advisory Board and the Religious Education Institute of the Church have also published a leaflet with information for children.
Help for victims of female genital mutilation
A leaflet exhibited at the booth gave an insight into the "Desert Flower Center" at the Adventist Hospital "Waldfriede" in Berlin-Zehlendorf. Victims of genital mutilation (FGM) have received medical and psychosocial help and care since 2013 (information at www.dfc-waldfriede.de). According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 8,000 girls a day are mutilated by the so-called ritual circumcision of female genitalia. Worldwide, there are 150 million victims of FGM. FGM is not practiced only in certain countries of Africa or Asia. Even in Germany there are 50,000 victims of genital mutilation. In Kenya, ADRA Germany supports the "Kajiado Rescue Center" to protect underage girls from forced marriage and female genital mutilation.
Democracy needs prevention
The German prevention day (DTP) is the world's largest annual congress specifically for the field of crime prevention and related prevention areas, explained DTP CEO Erich Marks. The congress offers an international platform for the interdisciplinary exchange of information and experience in prevention. This is how participants from 46 other countries came to Berlin, Marks reported in his speech at the opening of the DTP 2019. Based on statements made by experts from different institutions the "Berlin Declaration 2019" was written:
www.praeventionstag.de/dokumentation/download.cms
The statement made it clear that all those responsible for politics must deal more intensively and sustainably than before with the relationship between democratic social order and the prevention of extremism and crimes.