Love, Your Family

To Whom it May Concern,

It has been said that "family" is not about "love." I have heard from some that "family" means, only, that blood is shared, passed on through the sperm of one male human and an egg of one female human. That's it. A God intended it, and your family is your family because of this and only this situation having taken place. Not because they love you, or because they have given you any reason to love them. But only, and I repeat, only, because they bore you in a certain way.

Yes, they cared for you. Yes, they fed and clothed and sheltered you and showed you a certain kind of love in the best way they knew how. But why did they try to show this love? And why would they rip it away from you? Any reason? Can you think of any reason why you would remove your love from the life of your child? If "family" is only about a God having meant for certain things to be, then of course. If this God commands you to burn your only son, then of course you'll do it. You'll even give him the wood to carry to his own alter.

But perhaps "family" actually does mean "love." Perhaps "family" is something more complicated and difficult than sperm meets egg. Perhaps "family" goes back to the literal interconnectedness of every living thing on this planet. Perhaps we are all family.

I need to give voice to parents of adopted children. I need to give voice to strong birth mothers who give their biological children to others because they are not in an emotionally and/or economically healthy position to raise that child from birth to adulthood. I need to give voice to all families and say, if you believe in a God who only speaks to a certain select number of this vast human race . . . perhaps you have never met an adopted child. Perhaps you have never offered sheltered to an abandoned teen. Perhaps you have never known a niece or nephew who couldn't talk to their parents, but could talk to you. Perhaps you have been living your life in a way that no one who does not share your selective world view would feel able to "come out" and speak to you as a loving, supportive, caring human being they could trust.

Do you, honestly, when you look inside yourself, see a family with adopted children as "less" ? Do you, really, when you stop to think, believe that your God created some of his children as "less" worthy of your love?

This saddens me and I hope that, someday, I may welcome you into my family. My human family. Of love. Because my definition of "family" has broadened to include you, even if you disown me. Even if you disagree with me, hate me, or wish I didn't exist because your life would be "easier." My definition of "family" means human beings who genuinely care about other human beings, allowing them into their hearts and homes.

I am a humanist, and I love you.