What Is The Meaning Of "Orphan"?

November is National Adoption Awareness Month. This post is part a series about adoption and related issues, from my perspective.

Part of the controversy surrounding Madonna’s adoption of a boy and a girl from Malawi in recent years centered on whether the children should be considered orphans, because they had a living parent or relative.

I found a recent article from Lifelines, the quarterly report from Bethany Christian Services helpful. Here’s an excerpt:

“According to The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, “orphan” is defined as follows:

or-phan n. 1a. A child whose parents are dead. b.A child who has been deprived of parental care and has not been adopted…3.One that lacks support, supervision, or care.

Most Americans think of orphans as children whose parents (both) are dead. But today the international community often uses a broad definition of ‘children without parental care’ when they refer to orphans.”

By the way, I can’t think of a finer organization to invest your time or money in than Bethany Christian Services. My husband and I first interacted with them when we adopted our oldest child. I love that they not only are a top-notch adoption agency but they are also heavily invested in creating solutions for orphans that are even better than adoption, including tackling the systemic problems that create orphans in the first place. Again from the article:

“For Bethany, orphan care is first about supporting families who care for orphans—it is about finding effective ways to prevent children from going into orphanages…and it is about finding appropriate ways to remove children from orphanages and to return them to a loving home environment.”