The Seventh-day Adventist community is a wonderful group of down-to-earth, caring people who love God and the Bible. Unfortunately, the leadership of the Church has found itself mired in a controversy which they seem unable or unwilling to escape. For 120 years the SDA Church in Tonga has observed Sunday while the world Church observes Saturday. More recently this Adventist Sunday observance has spread to Wallis & Futuna, Phoenix & Line Islands of Kiribati, and now Samoa. The reasons given are related to the international dateline (IDL) and a refusal to accept local time. There are a few hundred Adventist Church members in Samoa who have refused to observe Sunday. So a dispute spanning 6 years has remained at an impasse with the Saturday Sabbath keepers marginalized by the Church they love. 

We PETITION for a properly organised open forum for church ministers, administrators, academics and scholars, as well as members in Samoa and abroad to be presented with comprehensive arguments on both sides of the current impasse and to discuss ways and means to amicably resolve the present, unfortunate and very damaging impasse which has plagued the Church in Samoa for almost 6 years now and return it to the ‘sunset Friday to sunset Saturday’ principle as stated in the Bible and Church Manual.