Preventing fires rather than putting them out: A historical perspective of caring for children in Guatemala

Preventing fires rather than putting them out:

A historical perspective of caring for children in Guatemala

On March 7^th and 8^th, 2017, a fire in Hogar Seguro Virgen de la Asunción took the lives of 19 girls between the ages of 13 and 16. Over the next few days, 21 more girls would die in the hospital from burns and smoke intoxication received in that fire.

It would be easy to join in with the crowd calling for justice, and I have found myself having those same thoughts. “Heads need to roll.” “It goes all the way to the top.” “Throw them in jail, and throw away the key.”

A tragedy of this kind which takes the lives of so many strikes a chord in all of us, but most especially when we are talking about children and in this case, adolescents. After all, if anyone deserves justice, those who are responsible for harming and killing children deserve it most, right?

I’ll leave “justice” in the hands of the government, at least for now, but to better understand how we got where we are today, we need to go back in time.

When we first arrived in Guatemala in 1988, children came to live in children’s homes or orphanages in one of two ways: judicial order or private placement. Judicial order means that juvenile judges placed children in Homes when those children were victims of abuse, were abandoned by parents or other family, and other reasons. Private placement was often simply an agreement between the family of a child, most often the legal guardian be it a parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle, etc. and the Home. At the time this was totally legal and a common practice.

Over time, new laws were written forbidding private placements which resulted in all placements being judicial. Adoptions, specifically international adoptions, were common and numerous. In fact, for the last several years leading up to 2007, the last year that international adoptions were open, 4-5000 children a year were adopted out to families in the United States alone.

All of that stopped when cases of corruption in the adoption process came to light and resulted in the passing of a new adoption law in 2007. Except for a few hundred adoption cases that had begun prior to the passing that the new law, all international adoptions came to a screeching halt. Literally, the baby was thrown out with the bath water.

Here we are ten years later. If one does the math, 5,000 adoptions times ten years equals 50,000 children who possibly would be living with families today, assuming that the number of annual adoptions had held at 5,000, and trends show that it could have continued to rise.

Critics of the adoption process point to a handful of cases of corruption including children who were kidnapped on occasion and “sold” into the adoption process, adopted by unsuspecting families who had no idea of the crime that had been committed. These cases are indeed tragic and deserved to be addressed and corrective action taken to stop it. But was the best way to handle this, or maybe the better question is, the only way to handle this problem, to halt international adoptions completely?

There are some good things on a small scale that have taken place due to the actions in 2007. National adoptions have been promoted, and many Guatemalan families have stepped up to adopt children. Many, many more are needed, but it is a start.

Society as a whole, and churches in particular, both Catholic and Evangelical/Protestant, have become more aware of the need to care for the orphan and the widow as the Bible mandates. While awareness does not always result in action, a few churches have moved more into the arena of helping to care for these children in different ways. There is talk of recruiting foster families from churches, for example.

But the other results have not been so positive. Children’s Homes are fuller than ever. Whereas a Home might have received 5-10 requests a year in the past, not a day goes by on average when judges and government social workers are making desperate phone calls, begging filled to capacity and over capacity Homes to receive children today.

Authorities assured the world that the measure to halt international adoptions was temporary, but as with many things involving the government, especially when it comes to children, “temporary” can be a lifetime. Meanwhile, another year here and another year there passes. Birthdays are observed and celebrated while those in authority consider how to best address the crisis.

And here lies the root of the situation in which we are living today. Children continue to suffer because of the actions and inactions of adults.

For years we have been calling for a complete restructuring, from ground zero, of the entire child protection system. At best, the system is chaotic, disorganized and results in children and youth languishing in the system for years, many times until they turn 18 and “age out.” At worst, the system compounds the trauma that these children have already suffered, be it re-victimization of those who have suffered physical and sexual abuse, frequent court hearings that are meant to assure that the child is being protected but in reality cause more harm and anxiety with each court visit, and due to complicated and often contradictory laws, preventing a judge from making a decision that is truly best for the child.

Here I will cite just one example. Esperanza (*not her real name) was abandoned by her parents when she was a baby. At a few months of age she was placed in a children’s home. It was determined that she was eligible to be adopted by a family. A family went through the process of trying to adopt her. Not just one family, not just two families, but three families over the course of eight years tried to adopt Esperanza. When she was old enough, she realized that people wanted to adopt her. She even lived temporarily with one of these families who treated her as their own.

But in each case, due to corruption or ineptness, authorities bungled each attempt to adopt out little Esperanza. The last case was particularly painful. Not only was Esperanza recovering from the second adoption process that had just failed, she was given new hope while living temporarily with a family when authorities from the newly formed National Counsel of Adoptions, known as the CNA in Spanish, approached the family about adopting Esperanza. The family was aware of a little known part of the law, Article 10, in the new adoption law that forbid anyone having anything to do with caring for children, be it children’s homes or organizations who assisted in any way, from adopting. They served as volunteer workers with an organization involved in securing and channeling donations of food to children’s homes. But the CNA authorities assured them that they had nothing to worry about, that this was a very special case, that exceptions could be made, and that the adoption would be approved.

The family prayed and agreed that they would pursue adoption of Esperanza. They excitedly began the process. And, of course, Esperanza was the most excited of all! But it was not to be.

After many months of working through all of the red tape of what should have been a simple process, the “new adoption law” failed little Esperanza. Would you like to venture a guess as to what part of the new adoption law that the top authorities of CNA cited? Article 10. They “interpreted” said article in such a way as to state that even though the family who wanted to adopt Esperanza were not directly involved in working at a children’s home, thus not in any way directly caring for the children in any of the Homes, due to their volunteer work with the organization that channeled donations to Homes, the law forbid them from adopting this precious little girl who had become a part of their family. It was heartbreaking for all parties concerned, but most especially for little Esperanza.

About a year later, a judge confronted a representative of the CNA with their decision. How could they have bungled this case of getting Esperanza into a family? Three attempted adoptions since the time she was a baby. But the CAN representative was firm in staying faithful to her bosses at CNA, stating that the law would not allow this family that loved Esperanza as a daughter, to adopt her.

So where is Esperanza today? She is in a Children’s Home. She has given up any hope of ever being adopted. She has no known biological family. But, thank God, she is surrounded by a family at this loving Home, who have committed themselves to raising her and being her family, at least as much as the law will “allow.”

So you see, while something like the tragedy that resulted in the death of 40 and counting girls brings to light the failure of society and the government to care for their children, the reality is that society and the government have been failing their children for many years. Just ask Esperanza.

A complete restructuring must start with undoing much of the law that has caused more harm than good. For example, changing the law that forbids families from adopting children just because they help in caring for these children in the first place. After all, who understands and loves these kids the most already? Who better to adopt them and give them the family they so desperately are crying out for? Would it at least not include those who are caring for them today? And let’s not forget a huge part of the Foster Care programs in other countries which is a pathway to adoption: “Foster to Adopt.” Under the current law, this is forbidden.

All laws pertaining to children need to be examined, filtering out duplicity and eliminating or rewriting laws that are at odds with each other. This does not need to be complicated. Keep the law as simple as possible, keeping the best interests of all children in mind when writing it.

Training for judges, social workers, and psychologists is imperative. Judges sometimes are appointed to juvenile court straight from criminal court. They have no experience, and seemingly little interest in learning the uniqueness of their duties in juvenile court.

Education in the universities for social workers and psychologists is sorely lacking when it comes to working with and treating these kids who come from troubled and traumatic places.

Most lawyers do not have any experience when it comes to children and adolescent law, much less the congressmen and congresswomen who are creating the new laws.

And above all, it starts with families. Parents. Fathers and mothers. Where are the fathers? Statistics in the past have shown that as many as 80% of mothers in urban areas surrounding Guatemala City are single mothers. Where are the men? And if the men are physically here, are they emotionally and spiritually “here” and engaged? Many, rather than being the protectors of their children, are the predators. Most tween and teen pregnancies are caused by fathers and other males relatives of these young girls.

Who should be involved in the process of developing this restructuring. We must start with the adults who grew up as orphans or as abandoned children, whether they were in Homes or not. Who better to give input into what the system should look like? Why not include adolescents and children themselves in the process? At the very least, why not include dedicated adults such as Catholic nuns, evangelical missionaries and others who have dedicated their lives to caring for these children for many years.

Money is not the answer to all problems. But in Guatemala it is painfully apparent that according to the government budget, children are not only not a priority, they are woefully relegated to low man on the totem pole. Ileana Alamilla in an op-ed piece entitled Un país en llamas (A Country in Flames) which appeared the Prensa Libre in the March 10, 2017 edition, noted that Guatemala has a “low public investment in our country designated for children: barely $0.69(US) per child per day, while in Costa Rica the investment is $4.91.” The adults play the fiddle while Guatemala and her future generations go up in flames.

People are the most valuable resource of any society. The young and the elderly are the most vulnerable. History shows that societies rise and fall according to how they treat the young and how they treat the old. How are we doing?

There is a sobering story in the Old Testament that is found in Judges 19:22-30. “When he got home, he took a knife and cut his concubine's body into twelve pieces. Then he sent one piece to each tribe of Israel.” (Judges 19:29) People had sunk into such moral degradation that it took something of this magnitude to wake them up to take action.

Could it be that God will use the tragedy in Hogar Seguro and the loss of life of these 39 (and counting) girls to wake us up today and take action to save our children? If something as terrible as what happened on March 7 and 8 won’t wake us up, I fear nothing will.

It’s time to start over, design and build a system from the ground up, not a “cookie cutter approach” from the United States or Europe or anywhere else, but a system that is applicable for this precious country and her people. We must start today before we lose any more of our most precious treasures, our sons and daughters.

-->

May God have mercy on us.