Tactics

http://www.christianpost.com/news/left-launches-attack-on-evangelical-adoption-94832/

I have two reactions to the criticisms outlined above. The first, more emotional response is to reaffirm something I've said before: To many on the left, if you are conservative then there is nothing you can do that is virtuous. Even the good that you do will be dismissed as cynical or destructive. The idea that my friends and family, who love their adopted children more than they love their own lives, have "orphan fever" is disgusting. Given that much of this criticism comes from unapologetic advocates for abortion-on-demand, I'm reminded of the words of Isaiah: "Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter."
Read more at http://www.christianpost.com/news/left-launches-attack-on-evangelical-adoption-94832/#ybcvqfG5IfePoZZZ.99 

Children's Rights

Below is a comment I made on a thread about homosexual marriage.  Someone else had raised the issue of children.  Being an adoptive mother, I have always held this issue close to my heart.  Having adopted around 1990, we were involved with a private agency that promoted open adoption.  At time, open adoption was still somewhat new and certainly broke the molds of my thinking and feeling.  But now, truly, I have to say that this is the humane option.  

Children become – and have already become – objects which others have the right to as opposed to subjects with rights themselves.  (Andrew)

This is really the most weighty point of all. What about the children?

The moment some raises the point that children ideally are raised in a home with their own biological mothers and fathers, the cry goes up that this hardly ever happens. There is so much divorce, etc. Yes, we know there is divorce and we know divorce is traumatic for children. But this goes way beyond the difficulties involved in changing your living arrangements. A person needs to know where he or she comes from. This is not trivial. A person needs to know her mother and her father. In Germany, the supreme court just ruled that someone conceived via insemination has the right to know the father, the sperm-donor.
Why does is always matter so much to people? Why are their lives consumed with finding a birth mother or a birthfather? Why are these teary stories always in the media? Because we need to know. We need to know so that we can know ourselves. A part of a person is incomplete when the relationship with the biological parent is missing. It is a human right to know your parents. And if you cannot live with your parent, you need to have a good reason to feel satisfied. Why did my mother place me for adoption… ? What were the reasons? Does it make sense? Did she care about me? Or I am I just trivia. People become obsessed with this.
Yes, yes, there are reasons why some of these relationships are not wise or feasible or sustainable… but again, the undesirable results don’t allow us to abandon all efforts at reaching the best outcomes. In Australia, just last week, the prime minister apologized to a conference center full of women for the decades of pressure put on single moms to release their children for adoption. A child is not a puppy. I don’t want or get a child just to complete the picture of a nice, little home. A child is a brand-new human person, created out of the love of a man and a woman. This is the bed-rock of existence.

Adoptees are the only party to an adoption without a voice. While adults make (and are expected to make) many decisions on behalf of their children, adoption is the only decision made for children that displaces them permanently. This isn’t to say that adoptive placements can’t be positive, growth-enhancing, and give adoptees a loving, supportive environment, but it can never negate the fact that there is another family out there with whom the adoptee is intimately connected. How adoptees acknowledge (or don’t) and come to terms (or don’t) with this dual ‘belonging’ is a question each adoptee has to answer for her/himself.

The adoptee or the child of sperm-donation has no choice in the matter. The impact of this needs to be fully considered, but one rarely hears about it.

In former times, when adoptions occurred they would involve orphans or extended family looking after children.  Or else the father would remarry and there would be a step-mother, which, after learning all of Grimm's fairy tales, was also not always an excellent solution.  But, no doubt, a step-mother can be easily demonized, no matter what she does.  The human heart will always cry self-pity and neglect.  Such, we are.  Anyhow.  And now, society is such, that hardly a family has the means to keep anyone at home for childrearing.  It has become a matter of funds even when there are two parents.  Who can take on an additional child?  Still, where ever possible and where ever reasonable, a child needs to have sufficient closeness to his or her natural family, mother and father. 

A terrible mistake was also made when various church charities came to this country and removed the aboriginal children to residential schools.  The well-known end of this story is most tragic. Anything that can be learned from this nightmare should be learned from this. 

Another mistake is being made in Africa where well-meaning charities set up orphanages when instead funds should be channeled to the surviving grand-mothers and older siblings to raise those who have not died of HIV/AIDS.  The orphanage strategy is very bad and we've discussed this previously (I'm not sure of the thread right now;  maybe I can link to it later.)

More on adoption

Someone, M. phoned me about adoption, yesterday, because of what I've written.  It was very kind of her and I thank her.  Thanks for reading my blog, too.   We are getting to know each other better and I appreciate that very much.  I also very much enjoy her son, who is my I-pod guru.

Among the things she wanted to say, and I am assuming she will be ok with me saying this here, is that I should not feel second best or think that adoption is second best.  And I just want to say, that's not what I meant.  I feel that some people act and talk as if adoption were second best and one comes across this not infrequently.

Open Adoption

Stefan's birthmom and her family came to see us after Christmas. It was such a gracious time and a real good release for me. She brought me a lovely present I will always cherish.  It's the pendant you just see above.

I have to say as an adoptive mother I've often felt second best, that people viewed me as not a "real" mother.  I still carry that chip.  N., you are such a trouper and such a good friend.

I've always done my very best to be open, loving and respectful with the birthfamilies and they have been truly amazing people.  God bless them all.

Sunday

This picture is of Stefan's two little siblings. We spent the afternoon with his birthmother's family in their new house.

We brought them Stefan's guitar (one of them) in his nice case, yesterday. Andrea and I had a very sad cry when it went out the door, not because of the loss of the guitar but because of everything. It was just too symbolic. Then we had a bit of a cry when it went in the door of their house. It was a satisfying day, however. We shared Stefan all of his 18 years and now we share the grief. We are big proponents of the open-adoption process.

I proposed, as well, that we do this on an annual basis, that is, get together the Sunday after Easter.

Cindy writes

There is a young woman, Cindy, with whom I work, who had this true story (the one below, not the one in the picture) published in a "Chicken Soup for the Soul" book. The foster mom written about is well known to me, too, and lives a mile from our house.

Having raised adopted children, I have often wondered what it has been like for them, at different times. But the story resonates with me also on a theological level, which I mention after the quote.

A SECOND CHANCE

I grew up as a foster child from the age of eight. Unlike most children I know, I never really had a biological mother. I never got to experience the unconditional love and wonderment a mother gives her child. So growing up was a bit harder on me that on most other children. A drastic change came suddenly when I was in the eleventh grade. I was now in my second foster home and had been there for the past five years. I was surrounded by a warm and caring family. But still something pained me deeply. I felt "out of place." I wasn't her birth child, so I remained distant, not allowing myself to love her as much as I could.

In one night, things changed for the better and forever. I was doing homework while waiting for the rest of the family to return home from their events. It was a daily routine. I spent most of my nights by myself finding things to keep me busy. As I was reading a paragraph for English I heard the closing of the back door and my foster mom calling for me. I walked into the kitchen where she was holding a hardcover children's book that she had borrowed from work. "I want you to read this," she said excitedly. "It's absolutely wonderful." She handed me the book, and I glanced at it with curiosity. "The Kissing Hand by Audrey Penn. I was just about to question her when she smiled at me. "Trust me. You'll love it!"

Reluctantly I grabbed a stool and made myself comfortable at the counter and began to read the book. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was a touching story of a raccoon mom who places a kiss in the palm of her child's hand to remind him that if ever he should get scared he just has to press his Kissing Hand to his cheek. That way he can always remember that his mommy loves him. I wondered why my foster mom asked me to read it. But I shrugged off the unknown answer and headed back to my room to complete my unfinished homework.

Later that night, I was sitting at the same spot where I had read the book and talking with Mom when suddenly she did something totally unexpected. She ever so gently took my hand and put a warm loving kiss in the center of my palm. She then quietly closed my hand and held it between hers and spoke words that I had dreamt of hearing for so long. "Whenever you get scared or sad, remember that your mommy loves you."

As the tears began to form in my eyes, I began to understand, and so I smiled a smile that touched the very depth of my once-wounded heart. I truly do have a mother. No she wasn't biological, but she was mine just the same.

CINDY

The story touches me also in this way: when one becomes a member of a family other than by a natural birth, another event may be extremely helpful to make the new member know that they belong and are completely accepted, such as this little ceremony of the kiss on the palm.

It makes me think of how we Lutherans see sacraments, how we know that we belong and are completely accepted. In both stories, the adoptive parent takes the initiative to make a promise and seals it with a physical event. I don't know, it seems kind of analogous to me. If I'm not entirely sure about my relationship with God, I have his promises and sacraments to make me sure.

Beautiful performer

Tonight, I'm listening to Stefan singing at his grad several times over, crying the way I did when I fist witnessed his performance. He was very, very good. He always loved performing. It did not matter to him if he had practiced his piece to perfection, but he still performed with flair and joy.

One of his welding buddies wrote a very sweet condolence card telling us that he was convinced that if the welding had not worked out, Stefan had a second career path open as a singer.

The Winspear Center is a great facility and the equipment made it sound so much more fabulous than it did coming muffled from inside his room with the door closed. It was so beautiful and astonishing. If you haven't listened to it yet, it posted under family music.

What else is sad, is that his birthfather only got to know him via these kinds of postings and clips on facebook. Now he is sorry he did not get himself involved in his life. I wrote to him and invited him to come and bring his children.