True Love Waits turns 10, heads to Greece

True Love Waits, an international campaign that challenges teenagers and college students to remain sexually abstinent until marriage, is weeks away from going to the 2004 Olympics Games in Athens.
   
LifeWay Christian Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention created the program, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year.
   
In the past decade, an estimated 2.5 to 3 million young people have signed a pledge to be abstinent until they are married.
   
True Love Waits pledges will be part of a moral purity celebration, as hundreds of thousands of signed pledges from Christian youth around the world will be displayed Aug. 22 during the XXVIII Olympiad.  
   
In addition to the colorful display of True Love Waits commitment cards from around the world, the celebration will feature music, Olympic athletes challenging students to take a stand for moral purity and youth from AIDS-ravaged nations giving testimonies of courage and moral resolve. A same-day video of the day’s event will be available for download on www.truelovewaits.com.
   
As a prelude to the Athens event, True Love Waits organizers in Nashville are marking the 10th anniversary of the first national display of True Love Waits commitment cards, which was held on the National Mall in 1994.
   
Keith Deltano will emcee the June 26 event in the city’s Centennial Park, and Christian recording artists will perform.
   
Tara Dawn Christensen, Miss America 1997, will address the crowd. President George W. Bush has been invited to participate in the Nashville celebration.
    
True Love Waits commitment cards brought to or signed at the Nashville event will be shipped to Athens for the Olympics display. (Lifeway)