Michał Belina Czechowski

Michael Belina Czechowski, in Polish Michał Belina - Czechowski, ( born September 25, 1818 in Sieciechowice in Krakow, Poland, † February 25, 1876 in Vienna), former Polish Franciscan priest, was the first Adventist missionary in Europe, but independent of the General Conference of Seventh- day Adventists. He contributed significantly to the development of a universal understanding of mission in Adventism.

Life

At age 17, Michael Belina Czechowski entered the Franciscan convent of Stopnica. He was ordained in Warsaw on 25 June 1843 priests. However, he was disappointed by the moral abuses in the monastic life, so he went to Rome, and in October 1844 an audience with Pope Gregory XVI. obtained. Czechowski was also politically active - he has stood up for the national autonomy of Poland and therefore had to emigrate.

Finally Czechowski left the Roman Catholic Church, married 1850 in Solothurn and worked as a bookbinder in Brussels. In London he met the Baptists, who helped him to a free passage to New York. 1852 offered him a job as a Baptist evangelist among the French-speaking Canadians in the U.S. state of New York, where he worked successfully and was ordained as a pastor.

He learned the Seventh- day Adventist Church in 1856 know 1857 joined them. He suggested in 1864 after several years working as a preacher in Canada and the northeastern United States, to go as a missionary to Europe, but the General Conference refused.

Since Czechowski had no own means, he secured the support of the Advent Christian Church in Boston. He traveled to Europe and began to preach in the Waldensian valleys of Piedmont. Because he met in Italy a lot of resistance, he moved to the French-speaking Switzerland, where he was able to form several groups of Sabbath keepers within three years, the largest in Tramelan near Biel. He baptized not only many Advent believers, but also dealt with several of them as literature evangelists. He also founded a publishing company. The first of his converts were Jean- David Geymet ( factory workers, and the first book Evangelist) and Catherine Revel.

Czechowski taught all the principles of the Seventh- day Adventist Church, though he himself was no longer connected with the community.

1868 refused to Advent Christian him further support. Then he left Switzerland and probably spent the rest of his life impoverished in Southern Europe. Czechowsky verststarb nachweislicherweise ( after confirmed death certificate ) to exhaustion in Vienna. Previously, he had in Pest ( Hungary) and Pitesti (Romania ) established Adventist churches.

Czechowski, leaving small independent Adventist churches in Switzerland (about Tramelan ) and in Italy. The members of these communities founded an Adventist magazine and made ​​contact with the Seventh- day Adventist Church in America, which led to a fundamental revision of the Adventist mission concept.