Two Sides of Christian Fundamentalist Adoption

A couple of great long stories went up this week about the “orphan fever” that’s been sweeping evangelical Christianity for the last few years. Jill Filipovic, writing earlier this year, sums it up well: “Adoption is crucial, [Christian advocates] say, to end an orphan crisis that impacts 153 million children. These are children from the Third World who have nothing; anything American parents can give them is better than their dire circumstances. They are living in orphanages just waiting for someone to come rescue them.”

The fact that 90% of those 153 million children are likely to have at least one living parent is curiously, or very worryingly, ignored. But adoption is often a really selfless act, and the New York Times profiles a Christian family whose dedication to their family is admirable and also undeniably faith-based.

In a few short years, the family of six had expanded to 10 — including three children with medical or psychological issues. It has helped that Misty has a high tolerance for — even thrives on — the “controlled chaos” of her big-family life. She also has unflagging energy and often manages on four hours’ sleep… Jon is an involved father who spends hours with the kids, coaching his oldest son’s wrestling team, dirt-biking with his teenagers and skateboarding with the younger ones. […] Misty acknowledges that raising children as Christians “absolutely” was among her motivations. “God calls Christians to reach the world,” she said.

Misty and Jon handle their foster-to-adopt children’s special needs with incredible care and seem deeply interested in being good parents. Slate takes on another side of the issue: the fact that new adoptive parents are often underprepared and almost always free from oversight. “It should go without saying that most devoutly religious adoptive parents, or conservative Christian parents generally, are not abusive,” writes Kathryn Joyce. But a few extremist circles stand by alarming traditions of obedience and sociopathic physical discipline, like those laid out in a popular book called To Train Up A Child. From an older piece at Mother Jones:

Fundamentalist preacher Michael Pearl and his wife, Debi advocate strict physical discipline starting when children are less than a year old. The book, which has sold nearly 700,000 copies, promises that “the rod” (the Pearls suggest flexible plumbing supply line) will bring harmony to a family in chaos, creating “whineless” children who have learned to submit. “Somehow, after eight or ten licks, the poison is transformed into gushing love and contentment,” they write. “The world becomes a beautiful place. A brand new child emerges.”

Dozens of internationally adopted children have died as a result of these strict “obedience techniques,” and Joyce’s Slate piece on an Ethopian girl named Hana Williams, who died of hypothermia, malnutrition and gastritis shortly after stumbling naked around her backyard while her adoptive family laughed at her, is comprehensive and incredibly sad. [NYTimes, Slate]