Thousands of Pathfinders from 14 European countries gathered between July 31 and August 5, 2023 on the campus of Friedensau Adventist University, in Germany, for the 14th Inter-European Division (EUD) Camporee. The international camp took place under the motto "#FOLLOW ME – Share your story".
According to the Adventist News Network and EUD News, official channels of the Adventist Church, the EUD holds its divisional camporee every four years, and the 2023 edition was the largest event on the region's youth calendar. The organization's initial projection was around 2,400 Pathfinders; the week's tallies, reported by the official sources, indicated attendance of approximately 2,700 participants, in the 12 to 15 age range.
What happened in Friedensau
For six days the camp occupied the campus of Friedensau Adventist University (in German, Theologische Hochschule Friedensau), in the state of Saxony-Anhalt, near Magdeburg, in eastern Germany. According to EUD News, the program combined outdoor activities, sports, practical everyday workshops, times of fellowship and Bible study — the classic menu of a camporee.
The opening ceremony welcomed local and church authorities. According to the account published by the university itself, the rector of Friedensau, professor Roland Fischer, and the mayor of Möckern, Doreen Krüger, were present and welcomed the participants. The scale of the event drew the attention of the regional press: the public broadcaster MDR even covered it on site.
Attendance figures varied depending on when they were counted. The projection released by the organization before the event spoke of around 2,400 Pathfinders, accompanied by a support team of approximately 300 people. The week's tallies, according to the official sources, counted around 2,700 young people camping. Both figures coexist in the sources; in this coverage, both are attributed so as not to mislead.
What a camporee is — and why every four years
For those just arriving in the world of the Pathfinders: a camporee is a large camp that brings several clubs together at the same time, with a program of faith, nature, sport and fellowship. There are club, regional, field (Conference or Mission), and Union camporees and, at the top of the scale, the divisional camporees, which bring together Pathfinders from several countries of a single Division of the Adventist Church.
The one in Friedensau is precisely of this last type. According to EUD News, the Inter-European Division organizes its divisional camporee every four years, in cooperation with the representatives of each country. The long interval has a practical logic: an international event of that scale requires years of logistical preparation — camp infrastructure, transport of delegations speaking various languages, food, security and a large team of volunteers.
In Brazil, the Pathfinder recognizes the format: our South American Division (DSA) also holds its own large camps, and the Brazilian public is used to camporees that gather tens of thousands of participants. The European camporee operates on a different scale of Adventist population, but with the same spirit: bringing together clubs from different borders around a single theme.
The motto: "#FOLLOW ME – Share your story"
Every camporee is led by a theme, and the 2023 one was "#FOLLOW ME – Share your story". The invitation "follow me" is a direct reference to Jesus' call to the first disciples, and "share your story" invites the young person to share their own experience of faith, in the style of a social network, with the hashtag built into the name.
The meaning of the motto was summed up by the EUD youth director, Jonatan Tejel. According to the official account, he stated that "the most important thing is that young people have a personal encounter with Jesus". The sentence sums up the aim of the camp: behind the workshops, the sports and the campfire nights, the goal declared by the organization is each participant's spiritual experience.
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The camporee gathered delegations from 14 countries of the Inter-European Division. Among the countries cited in the official sources are Germany, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Spain, France, Italy, Portugal, the Czech Republic, Romania and Switzerland, along with other representations from the region.
Most of the participants were between 12 and 15 years old — the core age range of the Pathfinders. Bringing together teenagers from such different languages and cultures in a single camp is, in itself, part of the value of the event: for a week, the Portuguese Pathfinder shares the same activity with a German or Romanian peer, and shared faith works as a lingua franca.
For the Brazilian Pathfinder, the comparison is worthwhile: while in the DSA a camporee may bring together clubs from several states of one country, in Europe the same event crosses entire national borders, with all the complexity of languages and passports that this involves.
What the Inter-European Division (EUD) is
The Inter-European Division, known by the acronym EUD (from the English Inter-European Division), is one of the worldwide administrative divisions of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Headquartered in Bern, Switzerland, it is responsible, according to EUD News, for the church in 14 countries of southern and western Europe.
It is worth explaining the term for the reader who is just starting out: in the worldwide Adventist structure, a Division is an administrative region that groups together several countries. Brazil, for example, belongs to the South American Division (DSA). Each Division organizes the Pathfinders in its territory, with its own calendar, materials and events — that is why the European camporee has a theme, language and logistics different from ours, even though the Pathfinder program is, in essence, the same worldwide movement.
The EUD youth department is the one that coordinates the divisional camporee. According to the official sources, the organization works in partnership with the representatives of each country of the Division, which explains the variety of delegations gathered in Friedensau.
Next chapter: Spain, in 2027
True to the four-year cycle, the EUD has already pointed to the next destination. According to the official account from Friedensau University, the 15th edition of the divisional camporee is set for Spain, in 2027.
Meanwhile, the legacy of the 2023 gathering stays with the participants themselves. A divisional camporee is not measured only by the camp's numbers: for many of those teenagers, it was the first time camping with Pathfinders from other countries, speaking other languages and discovering that the movement they belong to is bigger than their own club. That is the kind of memory the motto "share your story" set out to plant.