The "Adventist World," the international paper for Seventh-day Adventists, will launch in September, Dr. William G. Johnsson, Adventist World editor, said in an interview. The initial print run is for at least 1 million copies in English, with additional copies expected in Spanish and French.

"We anticipate that at least 5 million people will read each issue of the Adventist World" magazine, Johnsson said, who also edits the Adventist Review (ISSN 0161-1119), the weekly general paper of the church.

"It's been a bit like climbing a mountain range," he said of the multi-national publishing process, "Once you get to the top of one hill, you see another higher range ahead."

The new 'Adventist World' magazine represents a strategic move for the church, part of an effort " to foster the unity of the world Adventist family," Johnsson said when the new magazine was voted at Annual Council, the church's 2004 autumn business meeting. A presentation of the new magazine's design and concept was made July 2 at the world church's 58th General Conference Session in the U.S. city of St. Louis, Missouri.

The new church magazine comes with several elements in mind. All articles will be one or two pages in length, except for the cover story, which will run four pages. A focus on informing members about the world church is key, while articles on Adventist heritage, Bible questions and a simple Bible study will also be featured. An effort is being made to find writers from all over the world, in an effort to enhance the international perspective of the magazine.

According to Pastor Jan Paulsen, Adventist world church president, the program would "make it possible for one [monthly] issue of [Adventist World] to be distributed at no charge.... I expect over a million copies and it may well grow beyond that, depending on the demand from the world church," he said at the time of the Annual Council vote.

"We think it is critical to the church, to the church's witness, to the unity of the church that we have a voice that can speak to the whole world church, with the same message to all," Paulsen said at the time.

During August, Johnsson said, electronic files of the first issue of the Adventist World were transmitted to four different printing presses, located in the United States, Korea and Australia. "More than 1 million copies in English will roll off the presses and begin to make their way around the globe," he wrote in an Adventist Review editorial. "From Nairobi to the Netherlands, from Jakarta to Jamaica, the Adventist World will go out to serve the world-wide Adventist Church."

Estimates place the annual cost of the 'Adventist World' at under U.S. $2.5 million per year. The global print effort is a first for the church, enabled in large part by modern technologies that allow a "distributed" printing and publishing effort. The editorial responsibilities will fall on the Adventist Review team in Silver Spring, Maryland, with two additional editors in Seoul, Republic of Korea, adding strategic planning for the new church magazine.

In North America, the global 'Adventist World' integrated 16 pages of news and advertising specific to the church there. This is a merger of the former separate North American edition of the Adventist Review with the new publication, a church official said.

"We want our members in the United States and Canada to be connected to their brothers and sisters in Christ around the world," said Fred Kinsey, assistant to the president for communication in the church's North American region. "That's why we have merged the regional content printed in the Review with Adventist World's global focus. We look forward to having a part in bringing the world to our members' doorstep."

Seventh-day Adventists have long valued periodicals as a means of communication: the first issue of the Adventist Review appeared in 1849, some 14 years before the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, the church's world leadership body, was organized.

The Seventh-day Adventist Church is a mainstream Protestant denomination that has 14.3 million baptised adult members in 204 countries around the world. A total of 25 million Adventist Christians worldwide attend Adventist worship services each week. About 93% of the believers live outside of North America. [Editor: Mark A. Kellner and Christian B. Schaeffler for ANN/APD]