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"The Evangelical Orphan Boom," by Kathryn Joyce (Sunday Review, Sept. 22) offered important cautions for those seeking to care for orphans but ultimately obscured the most important truth of all. Indeed, as the essay argued, international adoption carries real risk of moral hazard and unintended consequences. This is true of any effort to address deep human need and demands great discernment and care.
The growth in action by Christians to aid orphans amplifies these hazards. Whenever efforts to aid the destitute increase, both positive and flawed outcomes tend to increase also.
But these important truths must never obscure the reality that millions of children today live without the love and protection of a family. Many can be reunited with relatives. Others can find other welcoming homes nearby. And for some, the only hope of a permanent family lies with foreign adoption.
Today's Christian engagement in orphan care includes all of these priorities. Caution and critiques are necessary in any such endeavor. But these actions can also serve as a rallying cry to all people of good will, reminding us that complexity must never become an excuse for inaction.
JEDD MEDEFIND
President, Christian Alliance
for Orphans
Merced, Calif., Sept. 23, 2013
To the Editor:
There are many thousands of children in the United States waiting to be adopted. These are children, wards of the state, whose parents are dead or who were deemed sufficiently abusive or neglectful to warrant the removal of their children from their care.
I hope that the evangelicals discussed in Kathryn Joyce's essay will look closer to home to find children to adopt as an expression of their faith. While children elsewhere in the world need homes, wards of the state throughout this country need homes, too.
LEAH HARP
Chicago, Sept. 24, 2013
The writer is a clinical social worker with a background in child welfare.
To the Editor:
Poverty and disability are what push most infants and children into orphanages, state institutions and other so-called children's homes around the world. And most of them have parents or extended families.
These are dangerous places for vulnerable children who can be abused, denied medical care or trafficked for labor, sex and organs. Even in "good" orphanages, an infant or toddler loses one month of development for every three months he or she spends in a group setting.
Children with disabilities are rarely adopted or put into foster care, and those who live through childhood — many don't — face a lifetime of institutionalization. Most families would keep their children with the right supports. But as long as churches, donors and governments keep building orphanages, they will be filled.
LAURIE AHERN
President
Disability Rights International
Washington, Sept. 26, 2013
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