Reinder Bruinsma is a retired Dutch-born Seventh-day Adventist theologian and church administrator who has served in pastoral care, publishing, education, and administration across Europe, West Africa, and the United States. He is also a prolific author who, among many other books and publications, recently has coedited a controversial book which advocates that people practicing monogamous same sex relationships should have the same rights in the church as people practicing monogamous heterosexual relationships. The book Adventists and Catholics: The History of a Turbulent Relationship is a revised and expanded version of Bruinsma’s 1993 PhD dissertation titled “A Historical Analysis of Seventh-day Adventist Attitudes Toward Roman Catholicism: 1844–1965,” which he successfully defended at the University of London. The book has six chapters, five of which are the revised text of his dissertation. The final chapter covers the recent history of the somewhat improved relationship between Adventists and the Catholic Church.¹ An extensive bibliography of published and unpublished sources and two indices of persons and topics concludes the volume.

Chapter 1 provides a survey of post-Reformation views on Roman Catholicism in England and America. While anti-Catholicism goes back to the establishment of the Church of England under Henry III (1509–15470), with the great influx of Catholic immigrants from Germany and Ireland,² the anti-Catholic climate increased greatly in nineteenth-century America. Chapter 2 traces the origin and progress of the Millerite movement and its anti-Catholic sentiments. Chapter 3 addresses the development and views of Sabbatarian Adventists as successors of the Millerite movement. Sabbatarian Adventists interpreted the prophecies of Daniel and Revelation in much the same way as William Miller and his associates had done.

Chapter 4 traces the development of Seventh-day Adventism and Catholicism between 1863 and 1915. While Adventists focused on the papacy as the fulfillment of the little horn in Daniel 7 and 8, and the first beast in Revelation 13, Catholics indicated their willingness to work with Protestants on social issues and in promoting Sunday holiness.

Chapter 5, the last chapter of the original dissertation, continues to describe the developments in Adventism and Catholicism from 1915 to 1965. The latter date marks the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council. During this period, Adventism developed into a unified and institutionalized movement that reaffirmed the traditional Adventist prophetic views of the papacy in Daniel and Revelation. During the same period, Catholicism in America grew in numbers (eighteen million in 1920; forty-two million in 1960) and in influence—for example, strongly supporting Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal and trade unions and establishing many parochial schools. Nevertheless, anti-Catholic sentiments in America surfaced from time to time on the issue of the separation of church and state.

Chapter 6 is the new chapter in the book. It surveys the theological developments among Seventh-day Adventists and Catholics from 1965 to the present. Within Adventism this period saw a strong expansion of the church’s institutional network, particularly in the medical and educational spheres. Theologically the church experienced a distinct polarization between conservatives and progressives. Among Catholics the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965) initiated important reforms in the liturgy, the role of the laity, and in the area of freedom of religion, but no doctrinal changes were introduced during or after the Council.

Reinder Bruinsma spends many pages on the historicist understanding of the prophecies in the apocalyptic books of Daniel and Revelation, which is accepted by most Adventist interpreters. He reviews their understanding and its application to the papacy on (1) the year-day principle; (2) the identity of the little horn in Daniel 7, and of the two beasts in Revelation 13; (3) the meaning of the seal of God; and (4) the meaning of the number 666.

Since 1950, besides having observers at the World Council of Churches’ Assemblies, as well as at Vatican II, Seventh-day Adventists have had several consultative encounters with the World Council of Churches and several Protestant churches, such as the Lutheran World Federal Church. Between 2000 and 2003 a small delegation of Adventists also met with representatives from the Vatican in Rome to discuss areas of agreement and tensions.

While attacks on Catholics by the official Adventist literature has stopped, the understanding of the end-time prophecies concerning the papacy as the antichrist has not changed and continues to be taught. Bruinsma and other progressive Adventists are frustrated with the continued focus on end-time issues and their application to the Roman Catholic Church (p. 260).³

In October 2020, the well-known Adventist theologian Jon Paulien gave three presentations at a Final Events Symposium of the Central California Conference. In his third presentation on “The Coming Sunday Law Dilemma” he stated that The Great Controversy must be read against the background of the nineteenth century, and that Adventists should not assume that end-time events will be identical to The Great Controversy in every detail. Many progressive Adventists therefore disagree with the 2021 announcement of Elder Wilson to distribute one billion copies of The Great Controversy (p. 278). They are also unhappy with the standard Adventist position that “Rome does not change,” which is based on Ellen G. White’s statement in The Great Controversy, “Let it be remembered, it is the boast of Rome that she never changes."⁴

The book Adventists and Catholics in some points provides an excellent historical survey of the relationship between the two churches. As one reviewer said about the first edition of his book that was published in 1999: “Unquestionably, this is the definitive work on SDA attitudes toward Catholicism.”⁵ The book is primarily descriptive, with only a few hints of the author’s personal view of the issue.⁶ In an article about the first edition of his book in the magazine Spectrum in 1999, however, he spells out his personal assessment of the topic more clearly.⁷ He asks the question: What does the church do with “end-time prophecies that are rooted in a nineteenth-century interpretation of the world?” And these prophecies are primarily found in the book The Great Controversy. Anti-Catholicism was rampant in nineteenth-century America, and Adventists fitted right in—after all, it was Catholicism that changed the Sabbath to Sunday.

The Adventist end-time scenario that was based on a diligent study of Scripture was confirmed and spelled out by White in The Great Controversy. And “once she codified those views, it became virtually impossible to reevaluate them critically without questioning her prophetic authority.”⁸ A second issue with which Bruinsma was unhappy was the fact that in his view Rome has changed, while Adventism has not. “Even in the momentous days of Vatican II (1962–1965) when Catholicism underwent enormous change, the Adventist view remained constant.”⁹ The reason, of course, was White’s end-time scenario in The Great Controversy.

The article in Spectrum caused Ángel M. Rodríguez, director of the Biblical Research Institute, to write a letter to Bruinsma, who was then the executive secretary of the Trans-European Division. Rodríguez questioned the “enormous change,” which in fact involved none of the doctrines of the Catholic Church. Concerning White, he wrote, “Obviously, if your arguments are valid, then we have to question and reject E. G. White’s prophetic authority."¹⁰

 Reinder Bruinsma challenged the Adventist Church in the Spectrum article by stating, “Some time soon the Church must decide unequivocally whether it is a Christian church—with its own unique witness—amidst other Christian churches, or whether it must stand alone over and against all other Christian bodies.”¹¹ In response, we can first point out that for the past sixty years since the Evangelical-Adventist conversations in the 1950s,¹² most Protestant churches have accepted Adventists as fellow Christians.

Secondly, isn’t “standing alone” part of our end-time outline for the future? Sabbath keepers and those who follow the call to “come out of her [Babylon], my people” (Rev 18:4) will have to stand alone eventually, as Ellen G. White indicates: “The observance of the seventh-day Sabbath is to be a sign between them and God, showing that they are to be a peculiar people, separate from the world in habit and practice. Through them God will work to gather from all nationalities a people for Himself."¹³

In conclusion, we are grateful for the historical record of the relationship between the Adventist Church and Roman Catholicism in the book Adventists and Catholics. However, there is no reason to abandon historicism and our interpretations on the little horn of Daniel 7 as symbolizing the papacy. Nor do we need to change our understanding of the two beasts in Revelation 13 and related symbols. What we need to do is proclaim the three angels’ messages and warn the world of these final stages of the great controversy.