Great Minds Thinking Alike: Jen Hatmaker

A couple weeks ago, I felt a heavy burden in the area of adoption and orphan care.

My burden resulted in my last post, "Orphan Justice: How Adoption Only Scratches the Surface". This post led to a great conversation with like-minded people on the subject, and also led me to writer/ speaker/pastor's wife Jen Hatmaker's blog series - "Examining Adoption Ethics."

When I read her third installment, I kept thinking, "Yes! Amen! Hallelujah!" Because I didn't realize I'd been echoing her sentiments in my own blog.

I'll pull out a few highlights and notable quotes for you:

"...Let's get our numbers straight... There are an estimated 153 million kids who've lost only one parent, so the term "orphan" is somewhat misleading... Unicef estimates around 2 million children in institutional care..."

My tidbit: Folks we've got to get our numbers right when we cite the number of "orphans" in the world. Although 2 million is a very large number (and UNICEF admits that this number is low due to underreporting in certain countries), it's a lot lower than 153 million!

Another thing I'm learning from my friends and co-laborers in the Arkansas Department of Children and Family Services... The word "orphan" is a misnomer for the 500,000 children in US foster care. These children almost always have a living parent, so they are nobody's orphans. As Christians, we understand the biblical mandate to "Care for Orphans," but we have to know in our hearts that we are oftentimes not dealing with a true "orphan."

"If we are truly concerned about orphan care, international adoption simply cannot be where we concentrate all our efforts. It leaves too many children behind."

My tidbit: I wholeheartedly agree with my Sister. And I'm the mother of a son adopted internationally. We've got to find strategies to encourage Russians to adopt Russian children, Ethiopians to adopt Ethiopian children and South Koreans to adopt South Korean children.

In his book Orphan Justice, Johnny Carr emphatically agrees, and works diligently towards that end. But I blogged about that last time...

My last Hatmaker quote:

"It is unacceptable that poverty makes orphans. That is a gross injustice at the root of these astronomical numbers. If you must relinquish your child because you cannot feed, educate, or care for him, the international community should rise up and wage war against that inequity. Every family deserves basic human rights, and I should not get to raise your child simply because I can feed him and you can't. 

"To that end, what better response than working to preserve (or reunite) first families where poverty or disempowerment is an orphan-maker?"

My tidbit: Amen! Amen! Amen!

For the last six months or so, God's been doing a transformational work on my heart. I am feeling a draw to support efforts that not only serve and benefit children displaced from their birth families, but to support the efforts that take a step backwards in this process.

How amazing would it be to not only care for orphans, but to care for disadvantaged families, with the hope and prayer that maybe their children will never become orphans?

This is no small undertaking. This is no minor calling. And this isn't as cute as adopting that adorable brown-eyed nine-month-old from Ethiopia.

No, this is a calling to get into the dirt and grime of material and spiritual poverty.

This is a calling to go where Jesus went.

It's a calling to go where He already is.

Let's go, Family.


Love,

Carla

Orphan Justice: How Adoption Only Scratches the Surface

I recently finished a book that challenged me in ways I didn't expect.

When I picked up Johnny Carr's Orphan Justice: How to Care for Orphans Beyond Adopting, I figured Brother Johnny would just be preaching to the choir. 

After all I've not only adopted two children, but I have also dedicated my life to fighting for other children that continue to wait for a loving adoptive family.

And who knows how many hours I've given to volunteer work for The CALL, a nonprofit organization in Arkansas that recruits prospective foster and adoptive parents from local churches, then provides the state-mandated training for those parents.

Surely I'd be considered "the choir" when it comes to orphan care ministry.

How wrong I was.

Orphan Justice not only encouraged me to continue fighting for the world's most vulnerable children, it also encouraged me to minister in ways that I'd not previously considered.

Today, I'll share my biggest "Ah hah" moment from the book:

Adoption Ain't Always the Answer

In his introduction, Carr cites that humongous statistic from UNICEF: 153 million kids worldwide that have lost one or both parents.

But then he makes this statement: 

"You may think I am here to tell you that American Christians need to step up and adopt all of these orphaned children. I am not. I believe adoption is a great ministry; in fact, I have adopted kids of my own. However, not all of these 153 million kids can - or need to - be adopted. But they do need our help. And we must give that help, because orphaned and vulnerable children have no other hope or future."

For the past year, God has been challenging me in my fierce support of adoption. He has shown that at times adoption can be the easy way out. 

Now, I still believe God calls many of us to foster and adopt children in need. I'll preach that sermon until the day I die.

But stay with me here...

Think about it: It's easier to terminate a parent's parental rights than to provide long-term parental training, guidance and mentorship. It's easier to find an adoptive family for a baby that was abandoned due to his or her parents' financial desperation than to financially assist the family and help them find sustainable sources of income.

It's also easier to love a cute, cuddly baby or toddler than it is to love their drug-addicted or incarcerated or homeless parent.

Bottom line: As long as the adoption process can take, it's definitely a lot faster - and easier - than walking alongside a family to help them support and raise their own child.

So What Can We Do?

Imagine a world where Ethiopian people open their homes to all the orphans in Ethiopia. Where Russians open their homes to each Russian orphan. Where Indians open their homes to every orphan in India. 

A world where international adoption is seldom necessary.

A world where orphanages are seldom needed.

As the national director of Bethany Christian Services' Church Partnerships, Johnny Carr is leading a movement to help Christians and churches in countries around the world care for their own orphans. In Ethiopia, Bethany has trained Ethiopian pastors to promote and help facilitate local foster care for orphaned children. So instead of living in orphanages, these children live with loving, godly families.

We can financially support, pray for and possibly volunteer for ministries like these.

We can also seek ways to encourage vulnerable families right in our own communities.

"People in poverty need support systems, good role models, and knowledge of the 'hidden rules' of the middle class," says Carr. "Many poor people, especially those whose families have been impoverished for generations, do not have these resources available to them, they don't know how to get them, and most do not even know they need them. As Christ followers, we need to help provide these resources in order to help children and their families get out of poverty, which will then decrease the number of orphaned, abandoned, and vulnerable children in our society. We are commanded to help orphans, but how much better it is if we can prevent children from becoming orphaned or abandoned in the first place."

This, my friends, is Christianity at work. This is the gospel in action. This is the call of the Church.

So what are we going to do about it?

Carla