The orphanage was a great mercy for Amir.
The 14-year-old Jordanian boy, whose last name is being withheld because he is a minor, was bullied in school after his father died. Then his mother, who was mentally ill and violent, was deemed unfit to parent. If not for a Christian orphanage, he wouldn’t have had any place to go.
But Nisreen Hawatmeh, director of Sanadak (“Your Support”), the evangelical ministry that provides psychological support to Amir in the orphanage, isn’t happy with how the story ended.
“Orphanages are very good in Jordan,” she said, “but not compared to a loving family.”
For Amir, however, a loving family was not available. Adoption is prohibited in Jordan.
The same is true in much of the Middle East. Islamic law forbids adoption. Children without parents or extended family are cared for by kafala, a system of child sponsorship that can include orphanages and foster care. But grafting a child into a new family is not allowed, because of how that would impact family lineage and the inheritance of biological children.
For Muslims, at least. Sharia law grants non-Muslims wide latitude to live according to their religion’s understandings of marriage, divorce, and inheritance, but it is often unevenly applied. In Jordan, constitutional amendments in 2014 permitted Christians—who make up only 2 percent of the population—to draft distinct legal statutes to govern Christian family life, giving them the opportunity to change the adoption rules that apply to them.
And they chose not to.
“Our problem is not the government,” said Haytham Ereifej, a Christian lawyer. “It is within our own community.” Within the past year and a half of intense interchurch negotiations…
This article was originally published in the September print edition of Christianity Today. Please click here to read the full text.
Jayson Casper 