Very interesting article about Loma Linda, California:

The city is best known for Loma Linda University Medical Center, where in 1984 doctors performed the world’s first infant cross-species heart transplant: "Baby Fae" was given the heart of a baboon.

Less known is that the university and medical center are run by Adventists. Loma Linda, home to at least 7,000 Adventists, one of the largest concentrations in the world, has been governed exclusively by church members since it incorporated more than three decades ago.

Adventism, a conservative Christian denomination, and the church’s holistic devotion to people’s health and spiritual well-being dominate daily life in Loma Linda, where biblical creationism and cutting-edge medicine exist side by side.

The city has a Ronald McDonald House to shelter the families of ailing children — but no Golden Arches. Most Adventists are vegetarian.

There are no bars in town, and at the city’s popular Adventist Book Center, the shelves are lined with volumes forecasting Armageddon.

Still, Loma Linda is no backwater. The population of more than 21,000 is downright cosmopolitan: Almost half the residents are nonwhite, and Adventists have Arabic, Cambodian, Chinese, Filipino, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Romanian, Spanish and Vietnamese congregations in town or nearby.