Romney urges single woman to give up her baby--or be outcast from LDS

Lorraine

Mitt Romney, as a leader in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, pressured an unmarried woman to give up her unborn child to be adopted. That revelation comes from The Real Romney, a new book excerpted in the February issue of Vanity Fair.  In the book, co-authors Michael Kranish and Scott Helman tell the story of one Peggie Hayes, who had a long-time connection with the Romney family.

Hayes had joined the church with her mother, and knew the Romneys so well that as a teenager, Hayes baby-sat for the Romney boys in Boston. In her last year of high school, however, her mother abruptly moved with her daughter to Salt Lake City. Peggie married, moved to Los Angeles, had a daughter, divorced, and eventually moved back to the Boston area, where she made contact again with the Romneys. She stayed a member of the Mormon church.

Adoption Reform and the LDS Church

Jane

First Mother Forum has gotten some flak from folks asking why we are bringing the Mormon Church into its discussion of HB 2904, the Oregon bill which would give mothers considering adoption time and information to make informed decisions.

Why didn't we resist the social pressures?

Some may ask why we did not resist the social pressure to give up our children, particularly since Lorraine and I were college graduates in our 20's at the time of surrender.

In addition to fearing the stigma which we knew would attach to us and our families as unwed mothers, many in my generation of birthmothers believed that keeping our child would be harmful to the child. Folklore passed to us through parents, clergymen, teen magazines, soap operas, and Ann Landers told us that children of unmarried mothers were always better off adopted by a married couple who had so much love (as well as material goodies) to give.

(The Mormon Church teaches this today. It saddens me that my surrendered daughter, Megan, a worthy church member, believes it.)

The social worker mantra "A child needs a mother (pause) and a father" rang in my ears. The only way Megan could gain a father was to lose me, a woman of no consequence.

I knew the pain of being fatherless. My parents had divorced when I was 15. My father, who died when I was 20, had not been involved in my life in a meaningful way since I was a small child. I envied girls whose fathers came straight home from work and presided at the dinner table, inquiring about their day at school. These fathers took their families on vacations every summer, taught their daughters to drive, and attended father/daughter events at church and school.

If a social worker had said to me: "Jane, being adopted in a closed adoption causes children problems. Your daughter may develop trust issues, she may feel abandoned, she may suffer from being raised by people who don't look or act like her, she is more likely to have behavioral problems and so on,” I would have kept her, no question about it. If the social worker had leveled with me about adoptive parents, that they, like other parents, might divorce, lose their jobs, suffer from alcoholism, or abuse their children, I would have walked out of the hospital with my daughter.

By 1966 when I gave up Megan, substantial research (as well as common sense) documented the many problems adoptees and adoptive families face. Social workers knew about them but didn’t tell us. I can only guess why.

And so, with no information to the contrary, I took as an article of faith that no matter how hard I struggled to raise my daughter, she would be better off, moving seamlessly into the mythical family, superior in every way not only to me but to my entire family. I envisioned her as a teenager screaming at me: "why did you keep me? I could have gone to a fine family and had a better life. You were a mean, selfish woman and I hate you!”

Mormons on Meeting your (Birth) Child

The comment from the Mormon birth/first mother to the last post has been on my mind because I am not too kind to mothers who stay in the closet from their children, and a good number of them turn out to be Mormons. She wrote:

"I wonder if many of these (possibly) Mormon mothers still feel alone, isolated, and wholly unworthy of speaking out or seeking contact. The social stigma of being an "unwed mother" still looms large in the LDS church, even if you were an "unwed mother" decades ago - it is a label that will never leave you in this culture.

Perhaps because I have an insider's understanding of psychological warfare used against relinquishing mothers throughout their entire lifetime in the Mormon culture, I am able to view some of these women's choices in a different light. I am not condoning or supporting their choice in any degree. My heart just aches for them that they feel like their own flesh and blood should have no contact with them."

Her post has been gnawing at me because I feel so strongly that mothers ought to at least meet their children ONCE face-to-face, and decide where to go after that; but I realize that a million different  cultural forces may be pushing up against them--just the way many of us felt when we relinquished in the Baby Scoop Era. And we want understanding and acceptance, don't we?

Additionally, I realize that my personal stance against established religions and their dogmatic views, despite having been raised Roman Catholic or perhaps because of having been, I am not as forgiving as I should be of those who are contentedly living within a religious culture that actively discourages contact. That would exclude most religions, including my own Catholicism, because they do not discourage meeting the child one gave up to adoption. From what I know, Mormonism does. Certainly the National Council for Adoption [NCFA] does, and the Church of the Latter Day Saints is a major component, though their adoption agencies, of that nefarious pro-adoption organization. NCFA is unquestionably one of the biggest stumbling blocks to allowing adoptees access to their original birth certificates. The only kind of adoptee-reunion legislation NCFA supports is a passive registry, with as many disqualifying caveats as they can unreasonably get legislators to agree to. So if anyone reading this is considering placing a child for adoption, stay as far away from any NCFA members as you can when choosing an agency. You can find a list of their members at their website.

As for first/birth/biological/original mothers who will not meet their children whom they relinquished for adoption, I know they exist. One has even gone so far as to sue the state of New Jersey for having released her identity to her daughter; another has a fervid website opposed to open records. While I truly deeply believe all mothers who have relinquished a child to adoption have an unwavering, unyielding, absolute obligation to meet their children at least once and open to door to those children to have a a relationship with their siblings if there are any, I try to find some compassion for those women, and birth father men, who struggle with this.

Where does this leave us? I do not have the answers. All I know is that giving up a child to the unknown, or even to known parents in an open adoption, is the most gut-wrenching, difficult, terrible, awful thing that a mother can do, and everyone suffers, mother and child. Birth mother and adoptee.

And the pain inflicted never ends. Adoption is the sorrow that goes on grieving.
___________
Incidentally, the woman who posted the above comment has a blog of her own: Letters to Mrs. Feverfew. And longtime readers know that in the past we have written extensively about the Mormon church and adoption. See Mormon Opposition to Open Records,
and Rachel's Origins Don't Include Me
and  An Inconvenient Appendage. For starters.
--lorraine

Perspectives on Open Records

My surrendered daughter Megan and I reunited in November, 1997 just after she turned 31. Although we have much in common and get along when we are together, we disagree sharply on adoption. Megan, a true believing member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, firmly believes that her adoption was God’s plan. I, a member of no church, firmly believe that Megan’s adoption was a result of a mid-twentieth century social experiment gone terribly wrong.

Last March I wrote to Megan inviting her to attend the American Adoption Congress (AAC) convention as I have many times in the past. I have to admit that part of the reason for inviting her was to convert her to my views, or at least let her see that adoption has its drawbacks. As always, she refused to come.

A month later, I forwarded Megan some emails from Bastard Nation regarding Illinois open records legislation. Megan lives in rural Illinois and at one time tried to get her original birth certificate.

Megan reacted angrily to the BN emails and ultimately wrote a letter to the Bloomington, Illinois Pentagraph denouncing open records legislation and its supporters. I in turn wrote to the paper supporting open records. In August, Megan asked me to stop sending her children birthday presents which I had been doing for over 10 years. We have not communicated since. See previous post, A Daughter's Change of Heart.

As I was cleaning out old emails, I came across the emails that led up to the Pentagraph letters. I am posting them and the Pentagraph letters here.

I’m not sorry about what I wrote to Megan and the Pentagraph although I am sad about the rift in our relationship. I should have been more sensitive to Megan’s feelings.

4/7/08
Jane,
I do not support the mission and goals of Bastard Nation nor the National Adoption Congress. Therefore, I cannot and will not support their political campaigns. Sorry.

Placing me in an adoptive home was the absolute right decision 41.5 years ago. I am grateful. You did the right thing. Never think otherwise.


4/9/08
Megan,
I apologize for not doing a better job of explaining what Bastard Nation and the American Adoption Congress are all about. Bastard Nation's sole goal is to have laws like Oregon's law which allow adopted persons to obtain their original birth certificate enacted in all states. I thought you supported this. BN's next big push will be California [where Megan was born].

I sent you information on the Illinois bill because I thought you might be willing to write a letter or two to your representative in Illinois to help Illinois-born adoptees learn the identify of their natural parents.

The American Adoption Congress' mission is openness in adoption, something I thought you also supported. AAC's main activity is to hold an annual conference where adopted persons, natural parents, adoptive parents, and adoption and child welfare professionals come together to learn more about adoption. Additionally, participants find it valuable to meet other persons who share their experiences. Most of the people who attend AAC conferences are adoptees. Some attend with their adoptive parents or natural parents.

Neither organization is anti-adoption.

Megan, I know you mean well when you tell me you are grateful that I made the decision to place you for adoption. To me, however, this is a terrible insult. First of all, I did not make any decision because I did not have accurate information on which to base a decision. Saying that I made the right decision is in effect stating that anyone selected by the agency would have been a better parent than I.

Telling me and others you're glad you were adopted, you were raised in the family in which you belonged, your adoption was God's plan, and so on demeans me.

While you may have benefitted in some ways from being adopted, you also suffered losses. In searching for me, you acknowledged some of these losses.

Our goal in this reunion journey should be to sooth the hurt we both suffered.


4/9/08
Jane,
You did a fine job of explaining Bastard Nation's and the AAC's position on open records to me. But, I have also studied these organizations for myself.

After much pondering and study I conclude that I disagree with their mission and goals. They wrongly use terms such as "human rights," "identity," "family preservation" and "rooted in truth," twisting the true meanings of these words. They use inflammatory terms such as "bastard," "baby thief," "primal wound," and "redefining kinship" to incite emotions. There is much ranting and raving without clear thinking.

The AAC states, "Every effort should be made to preserve the integrity the birth family." But I know that every effort should be made to preserve the integrity of the intact family--one that consists of a mom and dad who are also husband and wife. I know that calamities will befall our society as we move away from this basic, ancient family structure.

I believe in some adoption reforms. I believe in making records more open. But, I cannot accept the basic beliefs espoused by these organizations, so I cannot support their political campaigns. Their arguments seemed compelling to me at first, but I have finally rejected them because they are based on a flawed reasoning.

There is much healing to be done. Many, many members of the adoption triad yearn to be healed from the emotional strife that adoption can cause. Complete healing is possible, but espousing these organizations' philosophies will never provide long-lasting peace. There is a better way.

Megan

To be continued on Wednesday.

An Update on Rachael

I received a nice Christmas card from Rachael, my surrendered daughter Megan’s 20 year old daughter. This is the first communication I’ve had with Megan’s family in over four months. In August Megan asked me to stop sending her children birthday presents which I had been sending for a decade. I honored her request and didn’t send Christmas presents as well.

I hope Megan explained to her children why Jane was no longer sending gifts. I’m Jane, not grandma to them. Megan’s adoptive parents are on Rachael’s genealogy chart in the grandparent position. Rachael is proud of the fact that she is descended (sort of) from people who came up the Mormon trail. It doesn’t hurt me that Rachel doesn’t give me the privilege of being her grandma. She is a fine young woman and I’m happy to know her.

Mormons are big on adoption. The LDS Church pressures single women to surrender their babies or jeopardize their child’s chance to enter the celestial kingdom. Mormon Mother Marie Osmond has produced two songs “From God’s Arms to My Arms to Yours” and “Delivery” ("I delivered you from Heaven, from God's gentle loving care /And I've entrusted you to mortals who have wished and prayed you there”) to encourage these women to give up their babies.

Marie is not exactly a poster woman for Mormon Motherhood, though. According to Wikipedia, she married young and had a bio child; then divorced and re-married in the LDS temple. She and her second hubby adopted a child, had a bio child, adopted three more children, and had another bio child. Marie had a breakdown after the birth of the last child which she attributed to post-partum depression. She wrote a book about depression, “Behind the Smile”. She then adopted another child, making a total of three bios and five acquireds.

Several years later, tabloids reported that Marie attempted suicide. She and her second hubby divorced. One of her adopted sons entered drug rehab at age 16. It’s hard to imagine that these adopted kids would have been any worse off if God had left them in their natural mothers’ arms.

PS The Daily Bastardette has the video of Mormom Mother Marie singing the songs.

Rachael's Origins Don't Include Me

“How did you hear about the ‘American Girl’ show” the grandmotherly voice on the phone asked me? I looked around, and seeing the room was empty, whispered “from my granddaughter.”

I didn’t want Rebecca, my surrendered daughter, to hear me refer to myself as her daughter Rachael’s grandmother. Rebecca made clear when she first contacted me three years earlier that her adoptive mother and her mother-in-law were her children’s only grandmothers. At the same time, she never tried to hide who I was from her four children. I spent time with them when I visited Rebecca at her home near Chicago and later at her home near Bloomington Illinois; they visited me at my home in Oregon. I took Rachael and her sister, Chelsea, on a tour of colleges in Oregon and Chicago. Rebecca, her husband, and children came to our family reunion. Rachael and Chelsea email me occasionally and Rachael sent me the link to her blog.

It was Rachael’s twelfth birthday. I was purchasing tickets to take Rachael and Rebecca to the American Girl show in Chicago when the seller asked me the apparently simple question. But nothing is simple in the world of adoption. I did not want Rebecca to think I was assuming a forbidden role, thus I whispered. Rebecca's adoptive mother sent Rachael an American Girl doll for her birthday so our gifts complimented each other.

Last summer Rebecca and her youngest child Aaron, then eight, came to visit. I took Aaron to a local theme park with a friend and her grandson. My friend asked Aaron if I was his grandmother. He said “Well, she is my grandmother in that she is my mother’s biological mother but….” He stopped there, unsure of what I was.

This August just before Aaron’s birthday Rebecca asked me to stop sending her children birthday presents which I had been sending for a decade. I don’t know the reason for her request but I think it may be related to the Mormon definition of family which is not wide enough to include natural relatives. (See “An Inconvenient Appendage.”)

Rachael is now a sophomore at Brigham Young University in Utah. Recently, she attempted to answer the question “who am I” on her blog as part of a school assignment:

“I am a college student, I work a college job, I love life! I love my family, I love Chicago. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and believe in the truth of the gospel that is taught in this religion….

I am the oldest of four …and have mom, dad, two cats, dog, and rabbit (actually it's my sister's). Here's a little about where we come from. I don't mean Illinois, that shapes me too, but where we really come from. Our origins.

[Her mother’s adoptive father’s]… family has been in the US for many, many generations. Perhaps even back to the origins of this country itself. It's funny that these ancestors ended up in Illinois too, by the Mississippi, when they were taught about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. They moved down river to join other latter-day-saint members in Nauvoo and then ended up making the trek West to Salt Lake City with some of the first Mormon pioneers in their escape of persecution. Now I'm back in Illinois.

[Her mother’s adoptive mother]: These ancestors were converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints while in Denmark. They … took a boat all the way to America where they met the Saints out West….

. …I think that by learning about where I came from helps me realize the special worth I have on this earth. God made me for a reason!”

Rachael’s omission of her mother’s actual, biological, natural family may have been because this second second family didn't fit into the context of the assignment. No matter why she did it, attributing her origins to people who have no biological connection with her ignores an important part of her. She is her mother’s daughter, yes, but only through adoption is she connected in any way to the ancestors she writes about. Since adoptees that search talk about feeling unconnected to their adoptive families, I wonder if some might explain how they feel about their adoptive ancestors.

Rebecca’s adoptive parents imparted their faith in the LDS Church to Rebecca who in turn imparted it to Rachael. Her mother's adoptive parents, however, did not give her the interest and talent in writing, the difficulty in spelling, or her blue eyes. Rebecca and her family moved to Chicago when Rachael was seven and to the Bloomington area when she was 13. Her love of Chicago with her sense of connection to Illinois is one of those synchronistic things that occur in families separated by adoption. I grew up in Chicago and Rebecca’s biological father’s family was from Bloomington.

I am sad about being left off Rachael’s blog. I’d like to think that knowing me has had some value for her.

A Daughter's Change of Heart

My surrendered daughter Megan, a Mormon, searched for me for over 10 years, finally locating me in late 1997. Shortly after we reunited, she asked me what her original name had been. It was Rebecca. She said that her adoptive mother told her that I had not given her a name. Soon after that, Megan wrote to the State of California requesting her original birth certificate (OBC). Given that California still seals records and steals the name, she did not receive her OBC.

After our reunion, I tried to learn more about adoption. I attended conferences sponsored by the American Adoption Congress and Bastard Nation, advocates for allowing adoptees to receive their original birth certificates. While I had kept Megan’s existence a secret from most of my family, I became an activist for open records and encouraged Megan to become one as well. In August, 2000 she wrote the following letter to the Chicago Tribune:

“I've long been an advocate of open records. I am an adoptee. The birth certificate that I must rely on to get a driver's license, passport, etc., is a lie. It lists my place, date and time of birth and has a signature of the attending physician. And then it has the names of adoptive parents who were not there on that day. It places them at a place and time they were not. It is a cover-up.

I have long wanted to own a Certificate of Adoption that I could use for identification. It would list the place, date and time I was adopted. Really, my identify began at that moment.

I have a pretty good relationship with my adoptive parents, and I know they would never understand this.

Before I found my birth parents, I spent a lot of time scrutinizing my birth certificate, trying to make sense of it, trying to find my birth parents names listed somewhere between the lines. The certificate contained other facts about my birth, yet it left off the most important fact. I could not make sense of it. I want my original birth certificate because I want the complete truth, in writing, of who I am. I will still use the ammended [sic] one for legal purposes, but getting the original one would give me great satisfaction.”

Over the past eight years, however, Megan’s connection to the Mormon Church has hardened and our relationship has deteriorated. When we are together, we get along, agreeing for the most part on subjects like movies, raising children, protecting the environment. We enjoy the same activities, walking, theater, family dinners. We both wear simple clothes -- jeans and T-shirts -- and use little make-up. We make the same spelling errors -- we both routinely spell “amended” incorrectly. However, Megan cannot tolerate any discussion that she considers to be a criticism of the LDS Church or adoption. She believes that her adoption was God’s plan for her; that her adoptive family, the family to which she is joined for eternity, is her only family. I and my other children and her father and his daughter are inconvenient appendages. She recently emailed me and asked me not to send birthday gifts to her children, my grandchildren.

Early this year I forwarded Megan emails from an Illinois member of Bastard Nation with information about an open records bill in the Illinois legislature, HB4623. In a complete turnabout of how she initially felt, Megan wrote the following letter to the Bloomington (Illinois) Pantagraph.

“I am an adult adoptee. About 10 years ago, I made the choice to search for my birth mother and I found her!

I knew nothing about the "adoption rights'' movement. It was just something I wanted to do for myself.

The reunion with my birth mother was satisfying for me, and we still correspond and visit each other. After we met, I even attempted to obtain my original birth certificate, but was denied.

Since that time, I have been exposed to many, many communications from various groups pushing for legislation that would allow all adoptees the right to obtain their original birth certificates, regardless of the wishes of birth mothers.

At first, the political arguments made a lot of sense to me. However, after much careful study, pondering and prayer, I have decided for myself that I cannot embrace these groups' basic philosophy regarding family.

God has a plan for families. Children should be nurtured in loving homes by a father and a mother who are also husband and wife. "Redefining kinship,'' as advocated by the some of these groups, is a dangerous thing.

Furthermore, to obtain one's original birth certificate is not a civil or human right.
Because I don't believe in the basic goals of “adoption rights'' organizations, I cannot and will not support their political agendas, including open records for all adoptees.”

The letter created a ripple in the adoption rights community. A blogger in Australia ripped her for writing the letter pointing out that she had what she wanted but now would not let others have the same.

“That she has said all this AFTER She has *reunited* and REMAINS *reunited* with her Mother who gave birth to her and they still correspond and visit each other and not only that but the whole reunion was 'satisfying' for her...( I should be so lucky)

“BUT What Megan about all those other poor sods out there who NEED Their Original OBC To even 'begin' their search ? did you think about that ? What about them ?

“No sorry but your views are antiquated and self serving and certainly NOTHING To do with GOD.”

I don’t know why Megan wrote the letter – to get back at me for something? To reassure herself that her adoption was the right thing? I can only think that Megan struggled with the need to be true to her feelings and the need to be true to her church. In the end, the Church won out.

How did I feel when I read her letter? Disappointed, wistful, sad. Five years earlier I would have been distraught. I’m disappointed that Megan isn’t like Marley Greiner and the many other adoptees that fight for open records. I wish Megan and I could share our feelings about adoption. I’m sad Megan is so controlled by the LDS Church that she suppresses her feelings in order to support the Church’s fanciful views on the family. I’m sad that Megan can’t accept that she has two families.

--Jane

Mormon Opposition to Open Records

When I told Rebecca, my surrendered daughter who is a Mormon, that her Church opposed legislation allowing adult adoptees to obtain their original birth certificates, she asserted that I was misinformed: The Church had no position on opening records; she insisted; it was only the old fuddy duddies who ran LDS Family Services who opposed opening records and they would soon be gone.

Contrary to Rebecca’s assertion, the Mormon Church does oppose opening records. Furthermore, it stretches credibility to believe that LDS Family Services would take a position which had not been approved by the Church. LDS Family Services agencies comprise 26 percent of the 197 member agencies of the National Council for Adoption (NCFA) the leading opponent of open records legislation. It sends emissaries to oppose open records at public hearings all over the country; it initiates letter-writing campaigns opposing open records. Without NCFA and its “official” sounding name, it’s almost certain more states would have open records laws by now. Make no mistake; LDS is the enemy of open records.

NCFA claims that it opposes opening records in order to protect "the principles of mutual consent and the option of privacy in adoption," but that’s just a cover for the principles of Mormonism, that is that your only family is the one to which you were sealed in the temple; this is the family with which you will spend eternity. Keeping records closed helps perpetuate the Mormon tenet that single pregnancy is sinful and ought to be concealed by surrendering the baby for adoption. Finally, it actively discourages adoptees from searching for their natural mothers, and makes searching seem like something that a good Mormon would not do. (Ironically, Troy Dunn, also known as “The Locator,” announces that he is a Mormon who searched and found his mother’s biological family in the opening sequence of each show. Go figure.)

Let’s look at how LDS beliefs and practices encourage and further sealed records. It starts with the Church’s reliance on abstinence only-sex education and includes the Church’s opposition to abortion, and insistence that single mothers surrender their babies. These same conditions created a baby glut in 1960's. There’s no hard data but it appears likely that without an aggressive adoption program, there would be more Mormon babies available than couples willing to adopt.

Mormons marry and begin their families early. Thus they have fewer age-related fertility problems than the general population. LDS Family Services excludes gays, single people, and those who are not “temple worthy” from adopting. At the same time, Mormons eschew childlessness, putting pressure on infertile couples to adopt. Many couples, however, are reluctant to adopt if there is a likelihood that the child may reunite with the first family. They may turn to foreign adoptions where reunion with birthparents is often impossible.

The Church actively promotes surrender and adoption. Its monthly publication Ensign has frequent articles encouraging pregnant single women to surrender their babies. Each ward, an organizational unit consisting of about 200 families, has an adoption coordinator who identifies pregnant single women and counsels them on marriage or adoption. Each ward holds annual adoption promotion programs during Sunday services. LDS Family Services has adoption agencies throughout the country. (See earlier post. And post about Rebecca's hurtful email.)

Although Mormon adoptions today commence with some degree of openness, adoptive parents have the power to deny contact between the adopted child and his natural parents. A mother-to-be may meet the prospective adoptive parents at the LDS Family Services offices but they are not given each others’ names or address. Adoptive parents are required to send pictures and letters to the natural mother through LDS Family Services offices until the child is three. The natural mother may send letters and pictures as well. However, LDS Family Services reads the letters and may censor them or refuse to forward them to the adoptive parents. The parties can agree to meet and to continue contact after three years, but this means that the adoptive parents have complete control over whether this happens or not. If they wish to cut off all contact, they may do so; remember that the first mother was never given their name or whereabouts. At this point, the so-called open adoption can in effect become a closed adoption, just as surely as mine was in 1966.

As usual, as in the past, this puts all the power in the hands of the adoptive parents, leaving natural mothers once again at the mercy of adoptive parents, who could turn out to be just like the ones Lorraine wrote about in the previous post.

It seems obvious that Church leaders fear that opening records – giving adoptees the right to their original, first biological heritage -- would encourage reunions which would in turn discourage Mormons from adopting domestically. The inevitable result would be single mothers keeping their babies or placing them with non-Mormon families. But adoption by non-Mormon families would work against the Church’s fierce drive to increase its membership. Remember, one of its main goals is to increase membership -- that is the point of the two-year mission that all good Mormon men undertake. Additionally, if women kept their babies, the single-mother families might draw into question the Church's teachings that a proper family consists of a married man and woman and their children.

How do we combat this? Certainly it is an uphill battle, and with the LDS, we will never win in our lifetimes. But that means that we have to work all the harder to spread the message that the vast majority of first mothers desperately want to know the children they surrendered and pray for a reunion.

In a few days, I’ll post about reading my granddaughter’s blog – and learning that she has obliterated me from her “heritage.”

--Jane

Adoption and the Mormon Church

My surrendered daughter Rebecca is a member of the Church of Latter Day Saints (LDS, Mormon). In spite of a childhood marred by not knowing her origins, she accepts without question the Church’s precepts that all unmarried mothers should surrender their children for adoption. This doctrine is founded not only on the Church’s concepts of morality but on its beliefs about family and immortality.

The Mormon Church advises couples who conceive a child out of wedlock:

“…The best option is for the mother and father of the child to marry and work toward establishing an eternal family relationship. If a successful marriage is unlikely, they should place the child for adoption, preferably through LDS Family Services. … Adoption is an unselfish, loving decision that blesses the birth parents, the child, and the adoptive family.” (Quotations are from the Church’s website, www.LDS.org.)

According to Mormon doctrine we are put on earth to work towards perfection. After our death and resurrection, we will stand “before the Lord to be judged according to our desires and actions. Each of us will accordingly receive an eternal dwelling place in a specific kingdom of glory.” The kingdoms of glory in descending order are the Celestial the Terrestrial, and the Telestial Kingdoms. Those who are unworthy will be called the sons of perdition and “will have to abide a kingdom which is not a kingdom of glory. After death we may be reunited with family members who are in the same kingdom.

The Church’s rules on family formation are set forth in its 1995 “Proclamation to the World.”

“…Marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and … the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of His children.

“…God has commanded that the sacred powers of procreation are to be employed only between man and woman, lawfully wedded as husband and wife.

“ Individuals who violate covenants of chastity … will one day stand accountable before God. … The disintegration of the family will bring upon individuals, communities, and nations the calamities foretold by ancient and modern prophets.

By surrendering her child for adoption, a natural mother “ensures that the child will be sealed to a mother and father in the temple” and thus may have “an eternal family relationship” after death. Surrendering the child allows unmarried parents to atone for violating the covenant of chastity and “enhances the prospect for the blessing of the gospel in the lives of all concerned.” Finally, surrender protects society against disintegration and calamity.

If the threat of being excluded from a kingdom of glory is not enough, the Church adds the familiar arguments:

“Young women who choose adoption are more likely to complete high school and go on to higher education. They are more likely to be employed and less likely to live in poverty or receive public assistance. They are also less likely to repeat out-of-wedlock pregnancy.

Children who grow up without their fathers are three times more likely to have a child of out of wedlock, twice as likely to drop out of high school, and two to three times as likely to have emotional or behavioral problems, and they often become the poorest of the poor.”

Each ward (a church organizational unit of about 200 families) has a volunteer adoption counselor. The counselor contacts pregnant unmarried women, and if marriage is not possible or desired, refers them to LDS Family Services.

Each ward also holds periodic adoption promotion meetings during which the ward leader (bishop) reminds church members of the Church’s teachings on adoption. Adoptive parents provide favorable testimonials. The Church publishes articles it its monthly magazine Ensign urging pregnant single women to surrender their children.

Until recently, Mormon adoptions, like other adoptions, were closed. Now expectant mothers may select adoptive parents from profiles online and meet with them. The parties may agree to further contact.

The Mormon adoption mandate appears to be successful. Few Mormon women keep their babies. Those that do suffer condemnation from Church members. I have been told that while they can attend Church services, they are not permitted to participate in prayers nor sacred temple ceremonies.

This is the second of a series on the LDS Church and adoption-related issues.

Lorraine adding a note here:

The greatest most organized opposition to open records for adoptees comes from the National Council for Adoption. They send people to testify at hearings, they write letters, they have money to fight open records because they collect fees for adoptions...right?

And who make up a large--if not majority--of their agency members? The LDS adoption agencies. Given what Jane has reported (from their own website) NCFA will never support open records, and when any of you good soldiers in the fight against stupid sealed records come up against them...this kind of information should be made known to your legislators. NCFA must lose! NCFA not now, NCFA (Nik-Fa) never!