November 27, 2008
November is National Adoption Month, and the “Cry of the Orphan” campaign is raising awareness about the 130 million orphans around the world by providing families with resources and tools that will help them to take the appropriate steps in their own journeys.
According to Child Welfare Information Gateway, more than one-third of Americans have considered adoption, but only about two percent of Americans have actually adopted. Cry of the Orphan helps connect families with the world’s orphans in a variety of different ways, including domestic or international adoption, foster care, prayer for and mentoring of the children, as well as, support for the adoptive and foster parents.
This year marks the third annual, unified Cry of the Orphan campaign, which is sponsored by Hope for Orphans (a ministry of FamilyLife), Shaohannah’s Hope (founded by award-winning musician Steven Curtis Chapman and his wife, Mary Beth Chapman) and Focus on the Family. Together, these ministry organizations are communicating that everyone has a role to play in caring for God’s children. With this initiative, organizations, churches and individuals from across the globe are joining forces to help make a difference. Those who don’t feel called to adopt can rally in other ways, such as making a financial contribution, or starting a prayer group at a local church.
“This is a God sized crisis and considering we had like-mindedness, we believed that our voice can be louder together than individually on behalf of the orphan,” said Scott Hasenbalg, executive director of Shaohannah's Hope, Inc.
Paul Pennington, who is the executive director of Hope for Orphans, a board member of the Christian Alliance for Orphans and one of the leaders of the Cry of the Orphan campaign, said there are two primary reasons why people adopt. Either they want to have a family, or because they want to give a child a family.
Pennington, and his wife, Robin have one biological child and five adopted children. “My wife Robin and I have been married for 30 years. When we were early in our marriage and young, we had one biological child, Elizabeth. After she was born, my wife had already lost one of her fallopian tubes, and ultimately, she lost the other, so we experienced infertility,” said Pennington. “We first adopted began because we just wanted to have a family. Later in our journey, we adopted our third child from Korea. This time, it was more out of motivation to give a child a family.”
Pennington said there is a need for the Biblical understanding of adoption.
He realized this need for himself after a visit to a Korean orphanage made a tremendous impact on his life. There was a three-year old little girl on the tour, who kept pulling on his leg. She kept saying the same word every few minutes. Toward the end of the tour, he asked the translator what the girl was saying, and with tears coming down her face, the translator told him the girl was saying “daddy” in Korean.
“That is when the lights came on for me, that as the most affluent Christians who have ever lived on this planet in North America, we think we understand that there are orphans in the world, that there is a big need. But I don’t think we really internalize and comprehend the reality of what that means for these children. And we certainly don’t very often recognize that these children are a picture of our relationship with Jesus.”
Hasenbalg agreed, “Really the story of Christ is the story of adoption. In John 14:18 it says ‘I will not leave you as orphans I will come to you.’ Our adoption into Heaven was made complete thanks to the price Jesus paid on Calvary so adoption is not Plan B, it is Plan A.”
A key part of the Cry of the Orphan effort is online at CryoftheOrphan.org, which has tapped into the extensive resources of FamilyLife, Focus on the Family, Shaohannah’s Hope, and the other organizations involved in the Christian Alliance for Orphans.
CryoftheOrphan.org includes an easy-to-use tool that provides visitors with a personalized list of ways they can get involved to help orphans around the world. An updated directory of organizations involved, a Google Earth exploration tool, and facts and stories that offer inspiration and instruction on responding to the orphan crisis are also included on the site.
Projected to reach more than 25 million people within the faith-based community and beyond with its combined efforts, Cry of the Orphan is also reaching out with other endeavors, including a media blitz and radio broadcasts, including weeklong radio broadcasts that focused on the orphan crisis.
