To deny that God’s love for us (i.e., adoption love) is “unconditional love” is a strange and provocative thing to say. But I’m convinced it’s true. In his book Seeing with New Eyes, David Powlison writes:

I’d like to propose that God’s love is much different and better than unconditional. Unconditional love, as most of us [...]

Open adoption is a frightening or strange idea to many people. I remember talking to a friend whose sister had recently adopted — with an open adoption. My friend thought that the openness was unnecessary and probably a bad idea. This from a well-educated, sophisticated man.
One of the goals of our Openness in Adoption workshop [...]

From our Workshops and Events page:
The Vine Community Church in Taylors, SC, is hosting an Adoption Awareness Night on Sunday, November 9 (5-9pm). There will be dinner and speakers (adoptive parents, adopted persons, and birthmothers). More information is available at Child of the King’s website. Please RSVP to Katie.M.Nyblom@gmail.com or 864-430-4367.

On October 22 the Joint Council on International Children’s Services (of which Carolina Hope is a member) issued a policy recommendation about cultural sensitivity for U.S. families traveling to Ethiopia to complete an adoption. Here’s the policy recommendation (PDF).
Carolina Hope supports these recommendations and plans to implement them for our Ethiopia Adoption Program.

On October 23, Justin and Darcey, along with their son, Dex, traveled down to Greenville, SC, to welcome their new daughter, Breiden, into the family. They created a short video of the experience (about 2 minutes long), which they’ve shared with Carolina Hope.
 

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We just made the following announcement on our Ukraine Adoption page:

On October 14, 2008 the Ministry for Family, Youth and Sports published official Order #3899 approving revised procedures for submission of new adoption dossiers from foreign citizens in the fourth quarter of 2008. The annual adoption dossiers quota for 2008 had previously been set [...]

Dan Cruver of Together for Adoption will be speaking in the 9:30am service and 11am Sunday School this Sunday (October 26) at Woodruff Road Presbyterian Church in Simpsonville, SC. Carolina Hope’s Laura Godwin will be there as well with information about Carolina Hope’s adoption services and also embryo adoption.

Jason Kovacs of the ABBA Fund will participate in the Oct. 23 online workshop entitled Financing an Adoption.

Over at the Adoption Guide’s Advice page, I came across a document labeled “Accurate Adoption Language,” which links to a PDF entitled “Positive Adoption Language.” The fact sheet (reprinted from OURS Magazine, May/June 1992), has a fairly complete listing of preferred language (which it calls “positive”) and dispreferred language (called “negative”) for talking about adoption.
In [...]

In a week and a half, on October 29 (Wednesday, 9 pm), Carolina Hope is offering a live online adoption education course about openness in adoption. Here’s the write-up from the course page:
We often hear that families who are considering a domestic adoption are afraid of an “open” adoption. In this 1-and-a-half-hour course, you will [...]

On October 7, I posted a call to action from JCICS. JCICS’s advocacy — in conjunction with the advocacy of other stakeholders and concerned Americans — has resulted in at least limited success. Here is JCICS’s announcement.

Dear Colleagues,
After advocating on behalf of adoptive families for the past 6 months, Joint Council is very pleased to [...]

I had the privilege of preaching at Grace Church of Memphis yesterday on the cosmic significance of adoption within the story of redemption. You can listen to it here.

On October 23 (Thursday) at 9 pm, Carolina Hope Director Laura Godwin is teaching an online education course entitled Funding an Adoption. This approximately hour-and-a-half-long course will be conducted by phone and internet, so you can participate from the comfort of your own home.

JCICS sent out the following request:
The University of Maryland, Department of Family Science is collaborating with The Center for Adoption Support and Education, (C.A.S.E) to conduct a national survey of transracial adoptive families, examining the extent to which parents’ attitudes and practices impact the adolescent’s sense of self and racial identity. Joint Council asks its [...]

JCICS is urging all adoption stakeholders to actively participate immediately in encouraging USCIS to implement a policy that’s good for families and children regarding I-600A Renewals.

Tomorrow evening (Tuesday, October 7), Carolina Hope Christian Adoption Agency will hold its monthly Adoption Education workshop entitled “Introducing Domestic and International Adoption.” The workshop is free of charge and will be held at Carolina Hope’s office in Greenville, SC. More details at our Adoption Workshops page.