Talking Adoption: How Adoption Became a Christian “Trend”

Adoption and foster care are big issues for Christians. The first (and come to think of it, only) foster parents I met were members at Restoration Church, an evangelical church in Dover, NH, where I spent a year researching the movement for my thesis. The pastor, Nate Gagne, and his wife took care of a few different foster children over the months that I was there. I was impressed because, given his career choice, Pastor Nate didn’t have many of the financial resources that, say, my friends and I do. And yet none of us have ever considered becoming foster parents.

True, Pastor Nate was a few years older than us at the time and already had kids of his own—plus a stay-at-home wife—but this was clearly a passion for the Restoration Church community as a whole. The church even hosted information sessions about it to connect members of the church with the state system and educate them about the responsibilities of a foster parent.

Little did I know that adoption and foster care have a longstanding tradition within evangelicalism, fundamentalism, and other modern non-denominational churches. In 2013, the New York Times called it an “orphan boom.” Leaders like Rick Warren have called for Christians to become foster parents. The movement has been so big that it’s inspired a backlash; the first result on a Google search for “Christian adoption” is a scathing tell-all about a fundamentalist family’s four failed adoptions of children from Liberia.

I launched an investigation into this trend, which seems strange to call a trend, since it involves children and parents. Over the next several weeks, I’ll be periodically sharing perspectives from parents and children from adopted families. You can find the entire series here.

But first, some numbers:

• In the US, about 51,000 children were adopted from the foster care system in 2013. This number has remained roughly the same since 2002, with a spike in 2009 of 57,000 adoptions.
• In 2013, there were 7,092 international adoptions in the US; 10 years ago, that number was three times as large at 21,654 adoptions.
• 2% of American families have adopted a child; 5% of practicing Christian American families have adopted a child. Approximately 25% of all Americans have “seriously considered” adoption, while 38% of Christians have.

In general, international adoption is down, domestic adoption remains flat, and practicing Christians are more likely to adopt than non-Christians.

I’ve talked with Benjamin Corey, blogger and adoptive parent, about his family’s international adoptions. I’ve also talked with foster parents from New England who are battling in court to adopt their foster daughter. I’ve invited my friend, writer and editor Larry Clow, who was adopted here in the US through the Catholic Charities, to write about growing up as an adopted child. I’ll be sharing their perspectives over the next few weeks, and I look forward to reading your reactions in the comments.