Sometimes the Truth Hurts

(reposted from friends of ours)

Sometimes the truth hurts. Really hurts.  The Democratic Republic of Congo is a beautiful but ravaged nation in central Africa.  While it boasts the one of the highest (if not the highest) net worth of natural resources of any country ($24 trillion), its people suffer endlessly from poverty and a war that has claimed over 5 million deaths in the last decade.

People fleeing to a settlement camp.

Karel Prinsloo / AP

A settlement camp for refugees.

REUTERS/Finbarr O'Reilly

Here are some faces of the war:

A 14 month old whose mother is fleeing from attacks in her village by the Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels.

REUTERS/Finbarr O'Reilly

An 8 year old who was left for dead after his mother, father & 7 siblings were hacked to death by militiamen. I'm sure these aren't the only scars he will bear for the rest of his life.

REUTERS/Finbarr O'Reilly

A war orphaned child at an orphanage.

REUTERS/Finbarr O'Reilly

Some more facts:

While the average American makes $40,000 per year, the average Congolese person makes $200-$700 per year.  But don't think that their goods are cheaper.  They are not.  For example, formula still costs the same in the DRC as it does here.  How are these people expected to survive?

1 out of every 5 children under the age of 5 die from malnourishment and preventable diseases.  Education is not free.  So who can afford it?  The war is displacing thousands of people.  How will they work to support their family?  How can you break the cycle of poverty when you live under these circumstances?

The government does not have the means to provide for those less fortunate.  Who cares for the 5 million children who have been orphaned by the war or extreme poverty?  Only a small portion of those end up in an orphanage where they might get 1 meal per day.  No one regulates the orphanages to make sure that these kids are treated even remotely well.  There are a lot of evil people running them. And these children are the lucky ones. 

AP Photo/Jerome Delay

REUTERS/Finbarr O'Reilly



The rest end up living as street children, being kidnapped and forced into prostitution by sex traffickers or kidnapped by soldiers and being forced to carry heavy loads and fight and kill their own people and family.  These are children!  No child should ever have to go through that.   

AP Photo/Jerome Delay

We realize without a doubt that adoption is not the answer.  Adoption is not the ideal answer for any child.  Children staying intact with their biological families is.  But until there is a more permanent solution for this country to break its chains of war and poverty, adoption becomes one of the best answers we can provide.  We, as a family, will fill in the gap and give love, hope and a family to a child or children that need it.  It is what God is calling our family to do, and we can't say no.  Please pray for our children across the world that they may be protected and know that someone out there loves them.