How It Happened

While my son has been in his special pre-K program for three hours a day, I have been spending my time alone at my desk, editing a musicology book for an academic publisher, taking breaks only to drag my reluctant self to the piano to practice for a very demanding gig that I have next month.  A couple of weeks ago, I subscribed to the feed of a blog that I discovered through the process of clicking through links on other blogs, and I no longer remember what the source of the link was, or exactly how or why or from where I started the clicking process.  The blog's author is an orthodox Catholic woman who was at the same stage in the adoption process that our family was: her home study had just been approved, and she was waiting for a placement.

I had begun a novena to St. Jude in advance of his feast day, asking, among other things, that he would petition God to add more children to our family.  Two days before his feast day, on October 26, I was working on the book when an email came in from the Catholic adoption blog.  A new post was up, feauturing a picture of a gorgeous, smiling baby boy, and the news that he desperately needed a home.  I emailed the blog author with my phone number, and she called me back within seconds -- from a Bronx exchange.  It turns out that she lives about a mile away from my old home in the Bronx, that we have certain salient things in common, and that our husbands are both close friends of a particular Irish priest, a very wonderful man with whom my husband gets together whenever he goes back to New York.  The blog author had dearly wanted to adopt the little boy in the picture, but was unable to.  She had started the process, and had had a medical specialist examine his file, but, when her plans unraveled, she decided, out of love for him, to find him a good Catholic home.

She sent me his entire file by email.  I showed it to my husband, who said, "Aren't there any abandoned children closer to home?" and, then, "You know we'll have to go to China to get him," and then, "What about the money?"  As it turns out, because the boy is special-needs, the cost of adopting him will be roughly the same as it would be to adopt locally, as we had planned.  I told my husband that, if God wants us to do this, the money will be there (and, in fact, I'm waiting to get paid for the editing job, and hoping the check will come very soon so that I can turn some of it over to the adoption agency).  We started praying for the baby boy and for God's will in the matter.  My son was especially touched by the fact that little Jude (as it only makes sense to call him) doesn't have a mother or father.

From a purely rational standpoint, our local adoption process can only succeed if a birth mother chooses us to be her child's family, which theoretically might never happen.  Here is a baby who came to us in the most unusual way, who needs a family; it just doesn't make sense to turn him away.

He will need at least one surgery, perhaps more, for a condition that's not life-threatening, but which may or may not be quite complicated.  By the grace of God, we have access to excellent medical care, including a world-class hospital about a hundred miles away which treats a lot of special-needs adopted children.

I phoned the adoption agency to tell them we wanted to adopt Jude.  The coordinator told me another family was considering him, and, because they were already signed up with the agency, she would have to tell them first and give them first priority.  I got off the phone, cried, said a decade of the rosary, and emailed my new friend about it.  I immediately got a phone call from the Bronx:  "You call them right back and tell them that the person who makes the commitment is the one who gets first priority, not the person who's already signed!"  So I did that.  The coordinator said, "Um, hang on a second," put me on hold, and came back on a moment later, saying, "Congratulations."  So now I'm sifting through more paperwork.  And I have to enclose a sizable check.  Please pray that I'll get paid for my editing job soon!

In considering little Jude's medical problems, I had to reflect on the sense I have of my life: that I'm called to love people not in spite of their imperfections, but because of them.  Of course, I have to pray every day for the courage, wisdom, patience, and humility to fulfill this calling.

And it's also true that every gift comes with the cross.  Nonetheless, it would be silly to expect a perfect baby when I'm so far short of perfect myself.

Thank you, friends, for your prayers. I will keep you updated.