Christian Alliance for Orphans Webinar Series

Alliance Webinar Series

The Christian Alliance for Orphans Webinar Series is designed to help individuals like you create and grow effective adoption, foster care and global orphan ministry in local churches.


You're Invited...


Partnering with the Local Church to Care for Orphans in Haiti and beyond.

Practical advice, principles and practices for how your church can wisely partner with indigenous churches to care for orphans in Haiti and beyond.

Host Church: Northridge Church

Presenters: Michael Miller, Northridge Church, Michigan
Nick Adams, NorthPointe Community Church
Alan Hunt, World Orphans
Scott Vair, World Orphans

Date: Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Time: 2:00 PM Eastern

For more information or to register for the webinar, visit http://www.christianalliancefororphans.org/.


Each 60-minute webinar in this series will give local advocates access to the knowledge and experience of top Alliance member churches and organizations nationwide, covering key topics on adoption, foster care and/or global orphan care. Every webinar will be hosted by a local church orphan ministry and co-presented by one or more national experts on the subject matter. This pairing will deliver a combination of specialist information and resources alongside a “here’s how it works in a real church” perspective.

6 Haitian orphans who had been detained land in US

By CHRISTINE ARMARIO and KELLI KENNEDY, Associated Press WritersWednesday, February 24, 2010

Six Haitian orphans arrived in the United States on Wednesday, four days after Haitian police seized them out of fear they were being kidnapped. The children arrived on a charter flight to Miami International Airport. They will be taken to a shelter and their new parents can take the children home Thursday, according to Jan Bonnema, the Minnesota-based founder of the Children of The Promise orphanage.

On Saturday, a group of 20 men blocked four women accompanying the orphans to the airport, shouting: "You can't take our children!" Police briefly detained the women and the orphans — ages 1-5 — spent three nights sleeping on the ground in a tent city. The U.S. Embassy official carrying the documents needed to take them through immigration had been running late.

Sara Vanzee and her husband, Tim, had been waiting for their new 13-month-old son Albert to arrive. They understand the suspicions in Haiti given recent cases, but said their ordeal has been stressful. "Our hope is that they're OK with it, that they can see that we absolutely love these children and that we want to provide for them," said Vanzee, who is from the U.S. Midwest.

Such fears of child trafficking have made it harder than ever for impoverished Haitian children to leave the Western Hemisphere's poorest land. The concerns were fueled by the arrest last month of 10 U.S. missionaries trying to take a busload of 33 children to the Dominican Republic without proper documentation. It turned out none of the children were orphans, and the Americans were arrested; two — Laura Silsby and Charisa Coulter — remain in jail in Port-au-Prince.

Bernard Saint-Vil, the judge hearing their case, said Wednesday that he expects to decide their fate this week. He is waiting to hear from a judge in northern Haiti about a visit to orphanages the women made last year, and has asked judicial police to investigate whether Pastor Jean Sainvil — who helped them recruit some of the children — indeed has orphanages in Haiti, as he has claimed.

Thousands of desperate Haitian parents, unable to care for their own children, have eagerly given the youngsters away in hopes of giving them a better life. At the same time, they are terrified they will be tricked by predators who will enslave or sexually abuse the children. Haiti's government immediately halted new adoptions in the chaos that followed the Jan. 12 quake, allowing only those already approved to move forward.

That chill hardened into a freeze after Saturday's incident. A U.S. State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the matter's sensitivity, said the latest drama held up the departure of 50 orphans approved for U.S. adoption. It took the U.S. ambassador and Haiti's prime minister to iron out on Tuesday what turned out to be an ugly misunderstanding, and the children were handed over to the Embassy.

"They just kept singing and playing," said Maria O'Donovan, field director of the orphanage in northern Haiti where they had been living before the weekend. "They were so happy."

Two of the awaiting parents, Josh and Katy Manges, have been in the process of adopting 2-year-old Malachi since he was a few months old. Born with a deformity in his thigh bone, the boy was abandoned at a Haitian hospital when he was just a few weeks old. They get videos and letter updates from his caretakers. When the Manges flew to South Florida on Friday, they envisioned a happy airport reunion with their son before flying home to Chambersburg, Pa., southwest of Harrisburg. When they heard Malachi and other orphans had been detained by the government, they were stunned. They saw pictures of the little boy in a tent being cared for by young girls. "He was sleeping on a dirt floor, no diapers, no wipes, no formula," said 29-year-old Katy Manges.

The couple hopes their adoption experience sheds light on changes that need to be made by the Haitian government. "We have been in process for adopting him for two-and-a-half years and that's not right," he said. They plan to take Malachi home to their two biological children and daughter they adopted from Africa. Back home, 7-year-old Noah has already made Malachi's bed and put his clothes in the dresser.

In a Feb. 19, 2010 photo provided by Sarah Thacker of Fergus Fallls, Minn., Thacker is shown with a two-year-old boy named Reese whom she is adopting in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Thacker was among four women detained in Haiti as they were about to depart the country. Haiti's prime minister met with the U.S. ambassador on Tuesday to try to resolve the case of six orphans seized by Haitian police as they were about to board a plane for the United States. Photo: AP

Associated Press writers Jonathan M. Katz, Frank Bajak and Niko Price in Haiti and Amy Forliti in Minneapolis contributed to this report.being kidnapped.ay, February 24, 2010.

Haiti Orphan Relief Team

The Haiti Orphan Relief Team (HORT) is an amazing collaboration of disaster response experts and U.S. based orphan care and advocacy organizations. The goal of HORT is to identify, train and resource Haitian churches to be the direct rescue and care mechanism for Haiti's hundreds of thousands of orphans. This is truly the most effective and scalable response to a need of such great complexity and magnitude. The primary goal is to better enable Haitian churches to reunite or keep children within extended family structures. For children that have no other options, HORT will help Haitian churches to provide direct care in home environments, not institutional orphanages. U.S. churches are also part of the solution and are being recruited by HORT to come alongside these Haitian churches in church-to-church partnerships to initiate, strengthen and grow their outreach to orphans in their immediate communities. These partnerships will also work towards the self-sustainability of the orphan rescue and care efforts in Haiti.

For more information how you and your church can become involved, visit http://haitiorphanreliefteam.blogspot.com.

Partnering Organizations:
Christian Alliance for Orphans
Together For Adoption
Hope for Orphans, a ministry of FamilyLife
World Orphans
University of North Carolina School of Public Health
Sweet Sleep
Orphan Lifeline
Loving Shepherd Ministries
Love Haiti
Global Aid Network (GAiN), a ministry of Campus Crusade for Christ
Lifesong for Orphans

Strong on Zeal, Thin in Knowledge

The following article is taken from Christianity Today Magazine, Feb. 3rd, 2010. www.christianitytoday.com

Strong on Zeal, Thin in Knowledge
Lessons from Haiti's arrest of American Christians trying to take children out of the country.

Jedd Medefind posted 2/03/2010 09:56AM

Newswires buzzed recently with reports that a group of ten Americans from an Idaho-based Christian charity were arrested trying to transport 33 Haitian children into the Dominican Republic contrary to the rules of Haiti's government. Although details are still emerging, the story thus far suggests a potent mingling of good intentions with ill-advised plans. Fellow Christians embarrassed by the incident should have the grace to withhold the abuse many observers are now piling on the group, but we can still take a strong lesson on the need to match zeal with knowledge in every effort to "care for orphans in their distress."

According to their website, the group's goal was to "rescue Haitian orphans abandoned on the streets … and bring them to New Life Children's Refuge in Cabarete, Dominican Republic." This "Refuge" is at present a 45-room hotel the ministry leased to house the children as an interim measure. Ultimately, they planned to construct an orphanage that would provide long-term care, and also the potential of adoption for children that could not be reunited with relatives.
These rickety plans, along with the decision to remove the children from Haiti without approval, were a recipe for trouble. Adding further to the impression of sloppy do-goodism, it now appears that some of the children had living parents and were not in need of rescue at all.

Appropriately, many relief organizations have voiced strong concern over the incident. Meanwhile, others in the foreign aid world—which often tends to be dismissive of volunteer efforts and highly critical of international adoption—have sought to make the situation a cause célèbre. Private blogs and even some nonprofit websites now venture beyond the known facts, implying gross neglect of the children by the Christian group and even worse. No doubt some hope to harness the situation to foster broader criticism of adoption, and to emphasize the superiority of large-scale, government-centered models of aid to smaller acts of private charity.

Even as we apply strong words to the group's actions—"reckless" and "irresponsible" come to mind—we should first be reminded what this debacle does not tell us:

First, it does not tell us that Christians have the market cornered on well-intentioned but poorly-devised attempts at aid. Far from it. As writers like William Easterly and Dambisa Moyo lay out in disturbing detail, the history of efforts to help the needy—both government and private, religious and secular—is rife with failed largesse. A brief survey of public welfare programs in the U.S. alone would dwarf this situation in both size and foolishness for examples of benevolence gone awry.

Second, it does not tell us that compassion motivated by Christian faith is somehow peripheral to "real" disaster aid. Thousands of committed Christian organizations, churches and individuals—both foreign and indigenous—were effectively meeting deep needs in Haiti even before the earthquake. Today, these entities and recently arrived allies are central to relief efforts on the ground in Haiti, as are Christians in every catastrophe. The actions of a single small group certainly don't define the Christian response, nor should we feel embarrassed of our faith-inspired efforts in response to future disasters.

Finally, it does not tell us that the significance of adoption in caring for orphans should be marginalized. Although the press played up reports that the group had mentioned adoption to the U.S. as one potential way to eventually help some of the children, this was clearly not the group's primary focus. Nor could such adoptions have happened on any scale without massive amounts of U.S. and local paperwork, as any adoptive family knows. The group's errors to date were actually examples of on-the-ground orphan care gone wrong, not of mishandled adoptions. Yet no one is suggesting we should now shun orphan care, nor should they. The Christian community should stand strongly behind a full spectrum of in-country orphan care efforts, as well as the option of international adoption for children who'd otherwise grow up without families.

Amidst all this, what this situation does tell us is much more straightforward. Passion alone is simply not sufficient; it must be consistently paired with wisdom. Zeal without knowledge can be a destructive force. A compassionate impulse may indeed be God's nudging, and certainly should not be ignored. But the hard work of education, preparation, and planning most always stands between us and a job well done.

For those freshly woken to the needs of orphans, one other reminder will be helpful as well. Prior to the earthquake, Haiti had an estimated 380,000 children who had lost at least one parent. Tens of thousands lived in orphanages, on Haiti's streets, and as household slaves. These tragic situations are mirrored in many developing countries worldwide. So while the current crisis adds urgency to the biblical call to "defend the cause of the fatherless," the need to respond did not start with Haiti's latest anguish. Nor will it end when the television cameras no longer bring their images to mind.

Thus, in this moment—stirred as we are by Haiti's pain, and freshly reminded of the hazards of poorly-directed zeal—the most significant reminder is that knowledge-guided love is always needful. The emotion we're feeling is one that can be acted upon for the rest of our lives. Amidst the current crisis, we must help as best we can: giving generously, praying seriously, and even working on the ground alongside trustworthy organizations and local churches. Meanwhile, it's never too early to begin readying ourselves for a longer journey, joining passion with preparedness, and compassion with commitment, to serve wisely and well for the distance.

Jedd Medefind is President of the Christian Alliance for Orphans, which will host Summit VI in April 2010 to help churches and organizations seeking to engage in adoption and orphan ministry. He previously served as a Special Assistant to President George W. Bush and led the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.

"Speaking Out" is Christianity Today's guest opinion column and (unlike an editorial) does not necessarily represent the opinion of the magazine.

The following post is taken from the Tapestry Adoption & Foster Care Ministry blog at Irving Bible Church in Texas. ( http://www.irvingbible.org/ and http://tapestryblog.org/) It is a thoughtful commentary about the issues regarding Haiti and adoption.

As the pictures from the devastation in Haiti continue to pour in, the reality of the long, slow road of recovery and rebuilding is becoming more apparent. But even in the midst of the tragedy, heartache and seeming hopelessness, God is clearly at work. Over the past days we have seen and heard inspiring stories of remarkable faith, hope and courage from Haiti. And the response from Christians across the U.S. – particularly toward the orphans and vulnerable children in Haiti – has been equally encouraging.

Understandably, the situation in Haiti has led many Christians to begin asking questions about international adoption, and specifically about adoption from Haiti. There have been countless news reports about the status and future of international adoptions from Haiti and, not surprisingly, no small amount of confusion has resulted.

In an effort to provide some reliable facts and some helpful next steps, we wanted to let you know what we have learned about the current adoption landscape in Haiti. In doing so we are only attempting to touch on the high points. As always, if you have questions or need more information please contact Tapestry at tapestry@irvingbible.org and we will be sure to follow up with you.

Some Basic Facts about International Adoption from Haiti
Prior to the earthquake there were (according to recent estimates) as many as 380,000 orphans in Haiti. Tragically, some have estimated that the number of orphans in Haiti may double or even triple as a result of the earthquake. Yet despite this staggering number of orphans only a little more than 300 Haitian children were adopted by U.S. families in 2009. In addition, the average time to complete an international adoption from Haiti pre-earthquake was close to three years.

We could write a book about why this disparity between the number of orphans and the number of international placements exists, whether it is defensible (or not), why the wait time is so long, why the tension between adoption and humanitarian organizations exists and so on. But the reality is that international adoption was not adequate to address the needs of the vast majority of Haiti’s orphans pre-earthquake, and that will continue to be the case for the foreseeable future. As a result, we must all focus on the crucial importance of continuing to pray, give, advocate and serve – not just for the immediate needs in Haiti (which are many and urgent) but for the long-term. Along those lines, let us encourage you to continue to pray about how God would have you, your family and your church be involved to serve the ‘fatherless’.

Adoptions in Process Pre-Earthquake
The U.S. and Haitian governments have determined to “expedite” many of the adoptions that were already in process prior to the earthquake. This is being done via a process known as “humanitarian parole” and it relates to two categories of children whose adoptions were already in process pre-earthquake: (1) children who had been legally confirmed as orphans eligible for intercountry adoption by the Haitian government and (2) children who had been identified by an adoption service provider or facilitator as eligible for intercountry adoption and were matched to prospective U.S. adoptive parents. Certainly this is terrific news for the children and families affected and we rejoice with them.

Adoptions Post-Earthquake
We can make this real simple – as of now no new international adoption processes are being started for children in Haiti. As we noted earlier, one of the best and most reliable places to go for information on all international adoption programs (including Haiti) is the Joint Council on International Children’s Services (JCICS). The JCICS webpage for Haiti indicates very clearly that new adoptions from Haiti by U.S. citizens are “closed.” While there does seem to be some discussion in the U.S. about streamlining the international adoption process for Americans wanting to adopt from Haiti (and possibly other countries as well), there is no clear indication as to whether or when that will happen.

How You Can Respond
The fact that Haiti is currently closed for new adoptions should not discourage you from taking the next step and getting involved. There are many different ways to serve orphans in Haiti and around the world, and we would be happy to discuss your options with you – so don’t hesitate to contact us.

If God has opened your eyes to the needs of the ‘fatherless’ and is calling you to adopt – even if you feel called to adopt specifically from Haiti – there is still much that you can do. Many people think that beginning the adoption process means that they must research information about agencies, gather the necessary financial resources, fill out applications and start waiting. Some people are even considering rushing out to obtain a generic home study.

These are all certainly ways you can get started, but let us encourage you to “get started” in a somewhat different fashion. By pouring yourself into the tangible steps listed below you will be “getting started” in a direction that will help you build a strong foundation for one day loving and serving a child in need – whether from Haiti, your own community or wherever God may lead you:

● Pray – To some it may sound almost cliché, but the first step (and a continual part) of any adoption journey for those who are followers of Christ must be to pray. No matter where your journey leads you please continue to pray.
● Examine – Your motivations and expectations matter when it comes to adoption, and yet many people spend far too little time examining themselves. Read this helpful article about the importance of continually examining your motivations and expectations.
● Prepare – Children who are impacted by adoption and foster care have histories that can have profound impacts in a multitude of ways. These “children from hard places,” which certainly includes all of the orphans in Haiti, will need parents who not only have huge hearts and a deep well of compassion, they need parents who are informed, equipped and committed to building trust and helping their child heal. There are some great resources available to help parents understand these challenges and how to meet them. Some of the best resources can be found at Empowered to Connect.

Tapestry is committed to helping and serving families called to adoption and foster care in any way that we can. As the situation in Haiti continues to develop we will be sure to provide periodic updates on the Tapestry Blog.

In the meantime, please let us know how we can best serve you as you prayerfully consider how God would have you respond.

Update on Safe Families Haiti Initiative

Below is the latest update from Dr. Dave Anderson at Safe Families:







I thought I would update you on our current knowledge of the Haiti situation. If you've been following the news, you probably know:

150,000 confirmed dead with estimates of 200,000 total
194,000 injured
3 million affected
800,000 to 1 million displaced
300,000 children below 2 yo in need of critical nutrition


These are staggering numbers. Although searches are still going on, efforts are expanding to meet basic needs of food and water. Flights into and out of Haiti are increasing as well. They are now projecting 130 - 150 flights per day. United will again be flying charter missions later this week to drop off supplies and bring back people.

I've also learned a lot about the State Department. Illinois had us prepare for what they thought would be a surge of Haitian children starting last week and possibly continuing on for a period of time. This weekend, I was contacted via phone and email by a number of orphanges who were seeking assistance in extracting children. However, as time has gone on, it appears as though the State Department is standing firm on only allowing US residents or Haitians with pre-approved Visas to enter the States. They did ease some immigration restrictions by expediting children who were already in the pipeline to be adopted and had a family identified. So far, 263 orphans have been evacuated and connected with adoptive families. However, as of yesterday, the US embassy in Haiti halted the evacuation of orphans who were already in the pipeline to be adopted, per David Levanthal from Hope for the Orphans. Paul Pennington from Hope for the Orphans was in Haiti at the US Embassy yesterday with 20 children who were pre-approved for adoption and had awaiting families. They were told that the evacuation of those children is on hold. Paul returned to the states last night.

So... until the State Department eases immigration standards, that's where we are. However, they are routinely reviewing these decisions and changes may occur depending on need and capacity. Recent statements by the State Department indicate their commitment to provide support to Haitians in their own country. We've had discussions with DCFS yesterday about providing short-term care (6 months) to help alleviate some of the suffering. This was well received. However, until the State Department eases standards, this probably won't be an option.

The response to the projected need has been great. We are processing new Safe Family applicants now. However, if you sent in your application but decided that you do not want to go forth in the process until new Haitian children are definitely on the ground, please let the person who contacts you know that. Also, Lydia Home is not approved to do international adoptions. So... if you were hoping to adopt a child, please contact an international adoption agency like Bethany. Finally, if your interest in Safe Families is only to help Haitian children and you would not be available to help other children in crisis situations, please let us know. We wouldn't want to contact you for other critical needs if you would not be available.

Thanks so much for your interest. Keep praying for the people of Haiti and for wisdom for people in the State Department. The Christian Industrial League and the Red Cross are still processing legal immigrants coming on flights from Haiti. We've let them know that some of our families may be interested in accepting a parent and their children.

As we get more information, we will keep you informed.

Thanks.

Dave
www.safe-families.org

P.S. I just received this note from the White House. More information to come. "In our efforts to keep concerned communities in the United States informed about the current situation in Haiti, we invite you to participate on a conference call with Administration officials at 1:30pm EST, this Wednesday January 27th. The focus of this call will be on adoption and orphan-related issues, including an update on current U.S. government efforts and continued public guidance. "

Haiti's Orphans & Adoption

Agencies Overwhelmed by Efforts to Aid Haiti's Orphans
Katy Muldoon
January 22, 2010

(RNS) -- Alicia Swaringen of Eugene, Ore., received heart-swelling news the morning after last week's deadly earthquake in Haiti: Sthainder, the 4-year-old boy she planned to adopt, was safe. And then it hit her.

The adoption paperwork, amassed over three painstaking years, was in Haiti's Ministry of Interior, now rubble and dust. What, she wondered, would become of the affectionate boy she yearns to bring to Oregon?

By Tuesday (Jan. 19), Swaringen's fears subsided with news of plans to speed up as many as 900 U.S. adoptions that were already in progress before the quake -- and to ease the way for more.

Even before the Jan. 12 earthquake, Haiti was awash in orphans, about 380,000 according to the U.N. Children's Fund. Many had lost parents to hurricanes, floods, disease or poverty. They lived in about 200 legitimate orphanages or group homes. Other children, however, were sold through bogus orphanages.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has announced a "humanitarian parole" policy to expedite legitimate adoptions already under way. Plus, orphans with U.S. ties, such as family living here, will get special permission to stay.

A flight carrying 53 Haitian children landed Tuesday in Pittsburgh. In Miami, the Catholic Church proposed a plan similar to 1960's Operation Pedro Pan, which brought 14,000 Cuban children to the U.S. The Haitian version, Pierre Pan, involves placing thousands of children in group homes before pairing them with foster parents.

However, in the flurry to help tens of thousands of children that aid groups say may have been orphaned by the quake, agencies such as Eugene-based Holt International Children's Services are proceeding cautiously. "It's incredibly important in times like this to take every precaution that an ethical, professional, compassionate process takes place," said Susan Soon-Keum Cox, Holt's vice president. "There may be children that appear to be orphans, but we need to make sure there are no other family member or neighbors willing and happy to take that child into their family. We can't rush in and assume that they'd be better off somewhere else."

Holt, a nonprofit Christian organization, works in 14 countries to find children safe, permanent, loving homes. It has operated in Haiti for about a decade and had 21 adoptions in progress there when the earthquake struck. Employees at Holt learned by text message that the 30 children and their caregivers in Holt's compound about 40 miles from Port-au-Prince were safe. Cox said they expect the orphanage will serve as a refuge for many more displaced children in the months ahead. She and colleagues are working frantically to arrange for supplies and help.

Calls have spilled into Holt in recent days from those interested in adoption -- a trend, Cox said, that "demonstrates a real compassion. But we have to remember: Adoption is a very complex, complicated procedure ... It needs to be preserved for times when a child has no other possibility to have a family."

Swaringen met the child she hopes to adopt last May at Holt's facility in Haiti. Sthainder (pronounced Sten-dare) was 3, yet seemed sure the tall, blond woman was trustworthy.
"We walked up to each other," Swaringen said. "I sat on the ground. He leaned over, gave me a little kiss on the cheek and put his arms around me. It was so incredibly precious. He sat in my lap and hugged me for an hour ... We bonded immediately." Swaringen, 48, single and a massage therapist, has wanted to be a mother for most of her life. "Things didn't work out that way," she said. "So adoption was an obvious solution."

Three years after she started the process, Swaringen had planned her next trip to Haiti for February, when she expected to sign paperwork to finalize the adoption. She figured on bringing her young boy home in five or six months. Now, she said, "he may be here next week or next month. I just feel really blessed that there is this little boy there for me, and I'm here for him."

Copyright 2010 Religion News Service. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Find this article at: www.wyll.com/11625266/

Congressional Support for Focus on Haitian Orphans

The following, is from the Christian Alliance for Orphans web site. Let's thank and pray for these Senators that are being a voice for His children....


A number of Congressional members are working to ensure the U.S. State Department places full attention on issues facing orphans in Haiti as a key focus of the overall U.S. response. Among those at the forefront of this effort are long-time orphan and adoption advocates Senator Mary Landrieu and Senator Jim Inhofe.

A letter on Monday from Inhofe to Secretary of State Clinton requested “that the Department of State exercise broad discretion in the issuance of humanitarian parole and temporary visas for orphaned children who have connections (adoption or familial) with American families and to identify opportunities for orphaned children to receive temporary care and shelter within the U.S.”

While cynics could point out that standing up for orphans isn't exactly a “risky” position for an elected official to take, there’s no question that attention and “reminders” from Congressional leaders can help ensure that Executive Branch leadership and civil servants give active, aggressive attention to key issues that might otherwise have been left on the back burner. Also worth noting: Senators Landrieu, Inhofe and several others have been active and sacrificial champions of adoption, foster youth and orphans for years.

Haitian Orphans as Refugees to the U.S.

Below is a breaking news update from the Christian Alliance for Orphans.

The U.S. government is giving serious consideration to allowing a large number of Haitian orphans to enter the U.S.—essentially as refugees under special humanitarian provisions. Whether these children could enter permanent families through adoption in the short term is unclear. However, it appears likely that the primary entry point for them to the U.S. would be South Florida. Alliance member organization 4KIDS of South Florida has been contacted by Florida’s Department of Children & Families (DCF) with questions about 4KIDS’ capacity to aid with both direct care and connections to additional care options nationwide. 4KIDS informed DCF that they stood ready not only with their own network of churches in South Florida, but also to activate a vast network of churches committed to caring for orphans nationwide through the Alliance. If the Federal and state governments decide to move forward with this plan, we’ll be asking you to join this work in every way possible.

Haitian Adoption Status

Parents that have been in the process of adopting from Haiti are distraught at prospects that their adoptive children could be kept from them indefinitely as a result of the destruction of government records and systems and the loss of key documents, as well the deaths of key government officials. Meanwhile, a large number of American families are indicating their willingness to adopt newly-orphaned children.

The current focus of most organizations at present needs to be addressing immediate issues—medicine, water, food, shelter and other necessities. Even beyond the immediate crisis, it is unlikely avenues for new adoptions will open in the near term. However, officials in the U.S. State Department have begun looking seriously at alternative ways for families already in the adoption process to complete their adoptions as quickly as possible. (See their most recent public posting at http://adoption.state.gov/news/haiti.html).

The details of what alternatives will look like have not yet been revealed, and adoptive families should not yet raise expectations of immediate processing. What we do know is that in-process adoptions are the first-wave priority, and the State Department has committed to working to secure adoption visas (IR 3 and 4s) whenever possible as quickly as they are able. In addition, some members of Congress and advocacy organizations are urging the State Department to allow what called “humanitarian parole” for children who have been referred, which would allow the child to travel to the U.S. without a visa.

In the coming days, we anticipate an announcement from the State Department with greater details on visa and/or “humanitarian parole” options. In the meantime, per the U.S. State Department: U.S. citizens with pending adoption cases in Haiti are requested to contact the Department of State at askci@state.gov for information about their adoption case. In your inquiry, please include in the subject line, Haitian adoption Information. The inquiry should include the full name and contact information (including e-mail address) of parents, full name(s) of child(ren), date(s) of birth of child(ren) (if possible), a brief summary of the status of the case, and the name and contact information for the orphanage, and the file and/or case number.

Source: LifeSong for Orphans