Mary's Moral Decision: Lost Role Model Behavior?
Given the holiday season and mother-child theme that is celebrated by so many religious Christians this time of year, it seems appropriate for an adoptee to ask the question: what other option would Mary have had for herself and her child, given her pregnancy and unmarried status when she learned she could take Joseph as her legal husband and move far away to give birth to her baby, fathered by another? [The Christmas Story from the book of Matthew can be found here: http://holydays.tripod.com/christmas.htm ]
Was child relinquishment ever suggested to Mary, (as it is by so many modern religious adoption agencies to so many young unmarried pregnant females these days?) Was Joseph seen merely as a guardian-figure for Jesus, or was he seen as his second-father? [Because quite frankly, in all my Biblical reading, I don't ever recall Jesus acknowledging anyone other than God as his father. Not only that, once Jesus turned 13, Joseph was no longer mentioned, in any aspect of Jesus' or Mary's life.]
Comments
The more the merrier
Well, according to some from the Mormon denomination, "more is more" as Big Love reads may have us believe. Funny how the HBO version of the same theme doesn't give the same impression. http://www.hbo.com/biglove/
Which groups practice polygamy?
http://www.apologeticsindex.org/116-which-groups-practice-polygamy
Though illegal in most countries, polygamy is practiced by a number of religious movements (and tends to be tolerated in deference to religious freedom):
What's very striking about this, is the bitter irony how aggressive one group is in the hording and selling of other mother's children, all in the name of "religion", through private adoption practices.
A modern-day classic example
People might not know many "big love" families, because they're running from the law, so instead they are indoctrined in other ways. I don't know how many people caught it on Larry King Live, but here's an example of how much of a joke it is to learn a parent "forgets" her child is adopted.
KING: How many children are at home with you?
M. OSMOND: I have seven -- eight if you count my husband.
KING: And you have another child, what, on a Mormon mission?
M. OSMOND: Yes, he's on a mission. He's in Taiwan. He's speaking Chinese.
KING: They go from what age to what age?
M. OSMOND: Twenty-one, had him when were I was five, and to almost two. So, that's my baby.
KING: Are you done?
M. OSMOND: I'm done.
KING: How many are adopted?
M. OSMOND: I don't remember.
KING: Is it true, once they're there, you don't remember -- it's not remembering, you don't even think about it?
M. OSMOND: There's -- really, there's no difference. I can tell you that honestly, because I've had children of my own and I've had children that are adopted. And I don't even think about it.
They're just -- they're the joys of my life. It's really part of the reason why I did this. I think growing up on the road, I think it's wonderful and -- you know, for a long time I took my children with me as I toured. I used to do, you know, 260 days a year on the road doing fairs and festivals and honky-tonks and symphony dates and whatever.
But your children, once they start to get a certain age, they need to have their own life. And you have to realize that as a mother. And so, having them be in school and be in drill team and, you know, have those things, it's important.
KING: Why did you want so many -- let me ask you in a minute, I want to take a break. We'll take a break. We'll be right back with Marie Osmond. Why so many children, and lots of other things to discuss with a woman who talks about a lot of things.
She's still got her -- lots of things going on. Don't go away.
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0408/07/lkl.01.html
I think polygamy is wrong
I think polygamy is wrong it's bad enough people get married and divorce so often then to raise kids in that situation is also messed up. How many times are people going to get married run into problems and think about a divorce you can't just stop divorce from happening but no one ever tried to keep their relationships working.
Marriage and it's flaws
I wonder which is worse: getting a divorce, risking the social stigma that one or both partners didn't work hard enough to repair a damaged relationship, or marrying the wrong person for the wrong reasons, thinking sheer determination and strong will is enough to make a relationship good and worth keeping.
Of course, in my mind, as an adoptee... can anyone else see how marital divorce is no different from the parental-family divorce adoption brings a child or baby? How many mothers and fathers have been kept from establishing a working-relationship with their children, simply because a legal document states all bonds and obligations are to be broken?
divorce/adoption
A man and a woman divorce. They do not separate as blood relatives. In an adoption/divorce, you can NEVER change that
child's blood heritage. But in both cases it's a divorcing of emotional well being/who you are/who you thought you were.
Add abuse to either situation and it still divorces you emotionally and physically, but not biologically. Adoptive parents should be made to understand, that the child must be raised knowing who he/she really is and that they must have the right to experience that realness.
IN A WORLD OF WHY Teddy
Adoption agency misleading message
One of the saddest misleading messages I have found behind many adoption advertisements is this notion that through adoption, families are being Created. The truth is, before an adoption is allowed to become formal, one family must first be broken and severed, and hidden behind closed and even falisified record.
Where is the moral justice in such manipulation of family, names and facts?
Understanding vs. Feeling
I completely agree with what you say, Teddy, though understanding is often not good enough. I believe my adoptive parents on an intellectual level understood well enough what to do and what not to do. Some of the typical mistakes they didn't make, yet they never were able to outgrow themselves, live beyond their own needs. And it's not just them. I sometimes read adoptive parents blogs and forums and I see people pledging to be doing everything as is written in the adoption literature and yet the tone of these posts often demasques their own neediness. I guess it is hard to really understand the needs of an adopted/fostered child . I believe it requires a sensitivity that can only come from experience, either by having been adopted or by having been an adopter and seeing things go terrible wrong.
understanding versus knowing
And I have seen things go terribly wrong, which makes me understand. The sensitivity I have gained comes from gut-wrenching first hand knowledge of adoptions and families destroyed by agencies/workers/governments who
pass out the next child on the list to the next couple on the list.
You are correct in that I had neediness... and was willing to "take a special needs child because I was older." My
children were taken from their biological mothers and put in foster home after foster home before coming to America,
still an infant; a shell shocked infant who has already learned not to trust. Some of their biological parents abused
them so severely before turning them over to Holt Adoption Agency in their birth countries.
Does this not reek of abuse from day one? And the lies that are written and copied over and over and then given to
the prospective adoptive parents as gospel truth?
The sexual abuse and neglect some of my children suffered before coming home to me is only made less by the
evil abuse one of them suffered at the hands of her adoptive father! I lay in the fetal position, my thumb in my mouth
and scream, "OH, GOD! ANYTHING BUT THIS!" A man who passed as a good man was really an evil man who
fooled hundreds of people!
At 58, I am left to raise two precious 9 year olds whose only reason for being mine is that no one else would adopt a
baby girl with an unopened vagina, and a tiny little boy who is a HepB carrier that no one wanted but me. NO pats
on the back; he was very loved in the overseas foster home he had been in for a while, and I came and felt like I
was taking him from his biological parents. I also met his bio mom who already had another baby and only came
to sign the papers (she was leaning over the railing making a date with an unknown man). It made me SICK what
was happening to this child.
Adoptive parents have NO clue what transpires for them to adopt a child! But I was there and saw; but had already
fallen in love with my precious Jonah and could no more walk away and leave him than anything.
I know. I was part of that cult that damaged many of you here. But until you see the adoptions that go bad because
of the careless way children are bought and sold; unless you are personally involved in the destruction of those
families (bio and adopted families) you only see the cute babies in the gorgeous designer outfits with lots of people
ooohing and aaahing around the three who have no clue. I have a clue.
Yes, Niels, I agree: "I believe it requires a sensitivity that can only come from experience, either by having been adopted or by having been an adopter and seeing things go terrible wrong."
IN A WORLD OF WHY Teddy