So on our way back from our Edmonton trip Aaron and I had some chat time while the kids were sleeping... The topic: Would we adopt again? We feel we have enough kids. Life is busy (always is though), plenty of whining and wiping to last us a decade atleast. I mean, who doesn't want more spare time, money, and less responsibility! I certainly do, and having more kids would be going in the opposite direction. BUT, then I think of the faces I've seen of kids with no mom and dad, growing up in an orphanage and how could I deny giving them a home? My desire to read in peace and scrapbook looks completely selfish when placed beside those children. "Sorry I can't be your mom because I want more time for myself". So, WILL WE ADOPT AGAIN? It is not looking probable. I do not desire to wait 6 years and then start again - I really want to have this season of life and then get on with the next. So that means that we would start the adoption process again NOW expecting for it to take about 2 years. Eli is already 2 years old, and most likely we would bring home two year olds when adopting (by then he'd be 4 years). So why not start again? We simply can NOT afford it. We are still paying off our adoption (cost over $82,000 not including our van and all the medical stuff since) and we are also building an addition to our house right now. We currently have a four bedroom 1100sqft house, so were we to have more children we really would need the addition (another four bedrooms and a rec-room, extending our dining area, and making a larger porch so we can stop tripping over each other). So I do not feel guilty about the addition - it will certainly make life easier around here as the children grow up - and would be a neccessity IF we were to adopt more. To adopt domestically (within Alberta is what I mean) would not cost much at all, but the children waiting for homes here seem to either be 'special needs' or older children - neither of which we feel we could manage. Aaron brought up the thought of having so many kids that we just turn into an orphanage - but that wouldn't be the case. Even if an orphanage has a higher worker to child ratio and has workers that truly love the kids (both not very likely), the kids still get moved around constantly as they age into the next group (so no security in a caregiver because they just continue to change) and then they turn 16 and are sent on their way one day. No family that they BELONG to, no one to help them in hard times, no where to go home for Christmas, no one who really cares about them. Alone in the world at age 16 - no wonder the statistics are so bad. Argh!
And all that leads to another issue - Jesus! Who is teaching them about Jesus loving them? And as a Christian the Bible tells us to care for orphaned children and that "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans..." James 1v27a. I once heard that it would take only 7% of Christians to adopt an orphaned child to give each one a family - so I looked it up on the internet tonight. What I found is that there is 1.5 - 3 billion Christians, and that there is 18.5 million children without any parental care. So even if you take the 1.5 billion number of Christians, and then divide by two in order to provide a two parent family, you still get a ratio of 40 Christian couples to every 1 orphaned child. Unbelievable! Makes me feel the same way I feel when I read how daft the Israelites in the Old Testament were - I just want to scream 'wake-up already'! Yes, looking after orphans does not neccessarily mean adoption and there are certainly other things people can do to help - so, what ARE you doing? You don't actually have to tell me, but if you are a Christian you may be asked by Him one day how you obeyed in helping the least of these.
