In late 2006 our daughter Rachael and her husband Robbie set out on a journey that will ultimately lead them from Myrtle Beach, South Carolina to China. The journey I refer to is actually the adoption process for their daughter and my granddaughter, Emma. The trip originally was supposed to take about fifteen months. Now almost four years later, we are still waiting and it could be as much as two more years before their journey is complete.
Due to some changes in adoption regulations, they have received permission to pursue a domestic adoption concurrently with the international adoption and they are now in that process as well. That too has proven to be a challenging endeavor. To say this has been roller coaster ride of monumental proportions would be a gross understatement!
This situation is not unique to our family only. Literally thousands of couples have traveled this road before and thousands are on this road, littered with pot holes and detours, now. Some, finding the experience too difficult, turn back and give up. Yet many more doggedly keep moving on, faith exhausted, hearts aching, but determined as ever to bring their children home.
Since governments (domestic and international) and often politics play a role in all this, perhaps President Obama could help. If only he was as committed to adoption as he is to abortion. On the 36th anniversary of Roe v. Wade he said "we are reminded that this decision not only protects women's health and reproductive freedom, but stands for a broader principle; that government should not intrude on our most private family matters". What about forcing people to buy health insurance. Isn't that intrusion in a private family matter.
Abortion is wrong and unnecessary on several levels, one of the most obvious being that there are families who would love to open their hearts and homes to these inconvenient children. Childless couples who are in a constant state of grief over the child they've never had nor held would give anything and everything to have and love these unwanted innocent babies.
Freedom Mr. President? What about freedom for the pre-born. Please search your soul and realize they need protecting most of all. Intrusion Mr. President? Isn't being literally torn from the sanctuary of your mothers womb the ultimate intrusion!
Who will defend the world's unwanted and defenseless children (born and pre-born)? Who will help and support the thousand of families and childless couples who desperately desire to give a loving home to every one of them?
November is National Adoption Awareness Month. Contact the President, your Senator and House Member. Find out what they are doing in this effort and ask them to do more!
