Why adoption?

So there has been so much in the paper lately about Madonna and her rejected attempt to adopt a little girl from Malawi.

I will be honest in saying that I don't really like Madonna, not because of her adoption stuff... but just cause she's not my favorite. Although obviously I don't know her personally so who am I to judge? ;o)

I have been reading some articles that her attempt to adopt and subsequent rejection, have spawned.

There's the whole 'taking' children from their culture and children being better off in their own country debate. It's age old, and I am not sure if it will ever be fixed or truly answered. I certainly don't pretend to have all the answers by any means, and I see both sides of the coin.

Of course it would be better for children to stay in country with family to love and care for them. But there are SO many cases where this isn't an option. Quoted from this article on CNN, Melissa Faye Green writes:

CNN: What's your initial reaction to the news that Madonna's adoption of a Malawian child has been rejected?
Greene: Surprise. ... It was awfully tricky with Madonna's first adoption, when the child turned out to have devoted family members nearby. [The singer's adoption of a Malawian boy was finalized last year.] And if that's true with this child also, it seems a similar sticky situation.
That's not the situation for the majority of orphanage children around the world, who don't have caring grandparents or aunts and uncles a short walk or bike ride away.
I think it gives people an odd perspective on what international adoption can mean for children who don't have any support network outside the walls of an orphanage.
You often hear attacks on international adoption as robbing a child of his or her culture, and that's both true and false. It's true that an internationally adopted child loses the rich background of history and religion and culture and language that the child was born into, but the cruel fact is that most children don't have access to the local, beautiful culture within an orphanage. ...
There's a culture in orphanages that children are eager to escape from, and it's a culture of being reared as a group and not being doted upon by parents. For any child, that's the bottom line. The fact is that a human child wants that mommy or daddy or both. We're just wired to want that and to need that. And there's no way an institutional setting can give a human baby what the child needs. It's impossible. So you have to balance priorities. ...
I think what some of the human rights group say is absolutely accurate: that international adoption does not begin to solve the problems of the world's orphaned children. It's truly not the answer. ...
At the same time, international adoption, even though it doesn't solve the whole problem, it solves a problem for a few. I think it can be a brilliant solution to the problem of adults wanting a child in their lives or wanting more children in their lives and the problem of children who want parents in their lives.

I think she says it best. (that's why she's the writer!)

Of course it doesn't solve the problem, and I don't think celebrity or money should allow someone special treatment. I believe Madonna should have to follow the rules like the rest of us, but if the little girl she wants to adopt is legally available and the rules are followed, then why not?

I wish there were an easy solution, or answer, but like pretty much everything in life there isn't one. Especially where politics is involved.

My prayer is that those children that need homes, get them. I pray that those families that need help in order to keep their children, get it. I pray that those people that need medicine in order to stay alive to support their families receive it. And I pray that people that have room in their hearts and homes and can love a child that has neither... find the child to fill those places.