In our house, we live adoption and orphans’  issues every day – with the two kids we have already, and as we wait in-process for two more.  I know not everyone has reason to think of adoption, orphans, poverty and the needs of children without family support on a regular basis, though.

World Orphans Day

But November 2009 has been declared National Adoption Month by Presidential Proclamation.  And the Stars Foundation has organized a national World Orphans Day on Monday, November 9, 2009, so now seems as good a time as any for me to speak from my heart about one of the world issues that hits home for us in a most personal way.

According to a 2004 report, Children on the Brink (p. 29, 32), put together by the combined efforts of UNICEF, UNAIDS, and USAID, there were a total of approximately 16, 200, 000 “double orphans” (children with both parents deceased) by the end of 2003.  With the slump in the international economy and further parent deaths due to HIV/AIDS, UNICEF estimates that number to be even higher now, 6 years later.

The totals for orphans who have lost only one parent to death but who are living in poverty are an astounding 143,000,000 in 2003 and an estimated 145,000,000 by the end of 2008 (UNICEF 2008).  Many times, these children are placed in orphanages by the remaining living parents who cannot afford to care for them.  Others live on the streets.  Either way, the prognosis for their lives is not good.  Girls frequently end up coerced into prostitution to survive.  For boys, it is all too common for them to turn to gangs and criminal activity for their survival.

Obviously, Fred and I have a heart for adoption, and we’re happy to answer questions for anyone who has them.  But I know adoption is not the answer for every family.  And it doesn’t turn out to be the solution for the vast majority of the orphan population world-wide, those who are not legally available for adoption or who are too old or too “damaged” to be chosen by adoptive parents.  So aid organizations, children’s charity’s, family and town support agencies like World Vision, Compassion International, Save the Children and others stand in the gap.

But the need has not nearly been met yet.  And it’s one thing to look upon poverty in general and wonder about extenuating circumstances that brought a person there.  It’s quite another to look into the eyes of a child and know there was nothing he or she could have done to deserve to be malnourished, developmentally delayed, sick, cold and just so very poor.

eyes of an orphan