When we sought to adopt the first time, it was simply for two reasons. First, we felt God had blessed us with abundant love, home and opportunities and we wanted to share that with another child. I never really foresaw having four children, but we wholeheartedly felt God was calling us to that blessing. Second, God’s word clearly calls believers to take care of orphans. We felt that adoption was a pretty cool way to do that. Yes, I know those reasons are not “acceptable” within part of the adoption community, but those were our reasons. Whatever arguments you may have for or against our initial inducements, all I can say is, there is absolutely no way we could love our little Joseph more, and under no circumstance do we consider him a “charity chase” and under no circumstance do we believe he should “appreciate all we’ve done” anymore than our other (biological) children.

Rewind a couple years … we simply wanted to adopt an orphan in need. We knew so very little. As embarrassingly naive as it sounds, I thought ‘an orphan is an orphan’, and how can adopting one be bad? Perhaps we knew just a tad more than that, but not much. I thank God everyday He protected us, because quite honestly one agency with an absolutely terrible ethical reputation was on our “list of considers.”

So, we took the leap, and we sent in our application and began our process to adopt a baby boy from Ethiopia.

It was really then that I began to learn. I joined yahoo boards (several of them) and started reading blogs (lots of them) of families who had adopted from Ethiopia. I read lots of happily-ever-after stories. I also read several horror stories about agencies recruiting babies from hungry, poor (but probably really good) mothers off the streets of Ethiopia. I read of agencies lying to families, selling adoption as something temporary or as a coparenting type of situation. I read scary stories about one of the agencies we had considered, and wondered how in the world I could have been so ignorant. It is what it is, and I’m not proud. All I can say is, you don’t know what you don’t know, until you know it. I will never judge a parent who (unknowingly) signed on with an unethical adoption agency. It easily could have been me. I suppose it’s what you then do with that knowledge that matters.

Fast forward to now. . . we are in the midst of our second adoption, an adoption we did not initiate but one we are no less excited about. This time, however, could not be more different. Somewhere along the way, I misplaced my rose colored glasses. I now question everything, and want to challenge every truth that is thrown my way. I play a mental tennis match between God’s call to care for orphans, how to do that best, family preservation, supply and demand for healthy babies, and what that means for defending the rights of the oppressed. I wonder what was done for my sons’ birth father. If he had been given some assistance, could he parent these boys? My agency never considers “poverty alone to justify international adoption.” I want to know, specifically, what they do to back up their policy. What I blindly accepted as “good form” the first go round, I want details and specifics and proofs of this go round.

I have nagging questions that never existed before. “Did someone approach MB’s dad about adoption, or was it his idea?” “Did he truly understand adoption was forever, that he may never see his son again?” “Did our meeting with Joseph and MB’s dad and the pictures we sent look so appealing, so wealthy, that we somehow convinced him to relinquish another child?” For the record, I have no basis for these questions and I’m pretty sure I know the answers. I have no doubts about our first adoption. I consider our agency to be very ethical and I have no reason, through our experiences or experiences of lots of fellow families, to believe otherwise. However, since I misplaced my rose colored glasses along the way, I do not believe any adoption agency to be perfect, to be above reproach, above questioning.

In all this muddied water we call orphan care, I believe we can rely on One truth. God’s truth says “religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress” (James 1:27), and His word says to “defend the weak and the fatherless; uphold the cause of the poor and oppressed” (Psalm 82:3). I still believe adoption to be a good thing. However, to consider the needs of the weak and fatherless, the poor and oppressed, we must realize that sometimes those categories overlap overwhelmingly to our birth families. What do we do with that? What do we do for them?

If I could say one thing to someone who feels called to orphan care, to someone considering adoption, it would be to struggle . . . to research, research, research, ask questions, even the hard ones, and listen to the answers, even the hard ones, even the bitter we-had-a-horrible-experience ones. You don’t necessarily have to agree with their conclusion, but listen to their experiences and perhaps heed some of their warnings. Our children, our children’s birth families, our children’s nation – they are worth this struggle. In the end, seek knowledge, truth, and the Father’s wisdom.

What does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8

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Shonda is