Where to now?
Monday, April 20, 2009 at 01:00AM | Share Article 
You may remember that on March 15, I told you about a proposal I submitted to Qinghai's Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference in January 2008, which is now helping poor herdsmen and farmers get medical assistance.
Another proposal, which was accepted, was that provisional care needed to be provided for those who are no longer children at our Children’s Homes. It is the law that they should leave the orphanage at the age of 18. We agree that for their sakes, these young adults should leave the children's home, but where will they go? These adolescents, who are just starting to live independent lives, need to have the bare essentials in place. At the very least they may need housing, vocational training, or tertiary education. With these provisions in place, the children are now more likely to find a stable job and we can happily let them go off to begin living an independent life.
Reporters from CCTV were very interested in this unique proposal. They went to the Children’s Home and did an excellent job of reporting on Christian Action’s work with the government. Parts of the media interview with the Director of the Home were aired, and there was extensive news footage of life in the Home. Viewers would have been delighted as they saw the happy children in a clean, modern and bright environment. Most of the children are disabled.
It’s a wonderful sign of progress that people are now interested in seeing that the lives of the poorest, most disadvantaged members of society should be improved. I personally find this extremely encouraging.
Throughout the past decade we have consulted with the government on everything from co-managing the Children’s Home to the construction of a state of the art Children's Rehabilitation Center in that extremely remote, under served province. We have built expertise among their staff and most importantly, orphaned and handicapped children are benefiting. I thank God for this great privilege - and for you - without whom none of this would have been possible! Will you invite your friends to join in our team work? Fwd this news to them and remember to click on the Donate button yourself!
Reader Comments (4)
Great work ! I'd like to get involved.
I like the new idea of the changing images - keep up the good work!
Will you do follow up articles on what becomes of the former residents of the home who have to leave at 18? I'm interested in knowing how they fare in life after they are out in the real world. Do you continue relationships with former residents after they leave?
Thanks for being available for God's use.
Excellent question! It is exactly this issue that led me to propose the policy changes I wrote of in this post. I hope the government will agree with my proposal. I will definitely write about this in a future post - thank you for your comment!