The Global Orphan Crisis by Diane Lynn Elliot (book review)

Big A and I have a soft spot for orphans. We've always talked about adopting some day and we currently sponsor three children from foreign countries. Now these children have families but we want to help them to NOT become orphans by helpfully hoping out their families.

"The Global Orphan Crisis" by Diane Lynn Elliot talks about this preventative measure to take before children become orphans in developing or under developed countries. This book is chalk full of information on orphans (who are not just kids without parents but could be from single-parent families. In developing countries these are considered orphans because of the difficulties of being single-parent).

image via Amazon
The statistics are overwhelming (and can become so many in this book that you find yourself just reading over them, unfortunately): "153 million children have lost one or both parents and are, by definition, considered orphaned." That's not including the street kids or trafficked ones. Wow. I hope that's hard to swallow because this is not a subject to be taken lightly.

I enjoyed reading this book, although the writing was not palatable. It was dry, to be honest. But I kept at it because the information was necessary. I want to know about the crisis of orphans in developing countries like the one I live in, developing countries, and under developed countries. I don't think I learned anything that surprised me or was really new from this book. I'd heard much of the information before.

However, there were ideas for people on HOW to help orphans (how to help raise funds for orphans or those adopting, becoming an advocate, hosting "Orphan Sunday" at your church, sponsoring a child, praying for a child, Operation Christmas Child boxes, cook a meal for a single-parent family or foster family, etc). I think it's important for us to recognize that adopting a child is NOT the only way to help orphans. I love that this book helps us connect to other ways that we can help. I'm excited to talk more to my husband about our family will move forward to make our mark on the orphan crisis - whether that's adopting, praying for children or orphanage workers, financially helping children, or who knows what else.

Disclaimer: I received this book in order to write my honest review. All opinions are my own and may not be shared by others.

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