Book Review

Adoption and Spirituality
A Practical Guide and Reflections

by John D. Rudnick, Jr

Authors website: http://www.adosp.net/

The Willis Music Company, Florence, KY. ©2000.

ISBN 0-87718-999-4

Last Revised: 2/10/2001

Review by: James L. Weaver, FCC Webmaster

The title of this book is a reflection of the two foci of this book, adoption from China and a strong Christian faith. The China adoption process that they went through in 1996 is well described and typical for that time. Prospective parents should be aware that things have improved to some extent in the intervening time. However the author provides a nice flow chart of the entire process that I may well borrow for the FCC website. It is accurate today with only a few modifications, the time to referral is now about 7 months and there is no longer any need to apply for citizenship. Due to the two biological children, the author traveled to China as a sole parent, although with a group from their adoption agency.

One aspect that is less usual is that the authors family already has two children who were 10 and 12 at the time of the adoption. The description of how they were included in the adoption process is short but an important discussion that is not dealt with in other books on China adoptions.

The book also reflects the strong Christian faith of the author and his family. The text is heavily and frequently interspersed with Bible quotations. There are quotations and text appropriate to every phase of the entire process relating to both infertility and adoption. For those of similar beliefs, this book is an outstanding source for Biblical texts to study and reflect upon. The faith of the author is clearly strong but the book maintains a strong focus on the process of building their family and does not stray into more political arenas. These are the type of people who reflect the best of the Christian faith. While the quotations are frequent, they can be skipped by those who are only interested in the adoption process. This would be somewhat of a mistake as this reduces their story to the words without the music.

In conclusion, this book is a welcome addition to the library of books on China adoptions. It is especially welcome for those of strong Christian faith, a subpopulation not previously addressed.

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