Evangelical Adoption Movement Attacked…Again
Criticizing the evangelical adoption movement seems to be all the rage these days. Salon.com, a digital bastion of liberalism, ran an article arguing “the Christian right perverts adoption.” Hermant Mehta, Patheos.com’s “Friendly Atheist”, warned that we “should fear the evangelical adoption boom.” And Melanie Springer Mock of “The Nation” penned “Why Christians Like Me Should Listen to Critiques of Evangelical Adoption.” At the heart of their critiques is the work of Kathryn Joyce, the self-described “secular, feminist journalist” and author of The Child Catchers, who is again decrying the evangelical adoption movement, this time in the pages of “The New York Times.”
In her article, Joyce again paints the picture of evangelical adoption as a well-intentioned, but misguided, movement that exacerbates corruption and harms children around the world. It is a perspective I was first introduced to after reading Joyce’s “Mother Jones” article (“Orphan Fever: The Evangelical Movement’s Adoption Obsession”). I responded to her article at “On Faith and Culture”:
“In the end, Kathryn Joyce curses the darkness without lighting a candle. She attempts to pour cold water on the Christian adoption movement, but her ideas for actually solving the orphan crisis that now affects more than 100 million children are more than lacking; they’re non-existent. We should expect more from even an unashamedly partisan publication like Mother Jones. Not to mention a writer who recently published a 352-page book on the subject. “
Joyce contacted me after the publication of my article, and we had a rather heated exchange. She asked me to read her book, The Child Catchers, which I had already ordered before her request. The book arrived, and I read it, but I was not persuaded as she assumed I might be.
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