I have to say that the interest generated by my previous blog (about single adoptions from Ethiopia), and the feedback to the subsequent news report by Claudia Calleja on the same subject, left me pleasantly surprised.

Honestly, I didn’t think people would care so much about this matter. Hand on heart I thought that most would have been against single adoptions, and that even more would be against gay adoptions. I therefore assumed that my cries of discrimination would fall on deaf ears.

But boy, how wrong I was.

Soon after the story broke, popular TV programmes such as TVAM quickly picked up the subject, as will Xarabank and Radju Malta’s ‘Ghandi Xi Nghid’ next Friday and Saturday, and I don’t think it’s just a question of jumping on the bandwagon.

I’m also pretty sure that it wasn’t because people were surprised to find out that The Church seems to be against single and gay adoptions; I mean seriously, who could ever be surprised by that?

On the contrary, the chorus of disapproval was caused because up until going to print, Malta’s and Ethiopia’s laws did not refuse singles’ applications for adoption, and yet an informal and somewhat secretive instruction was issued by The Curia to a Church-run orphanage in Ethiopia, in order to stop single adoptions altogether.

Unfortunately, though the instructions were verbal and informal, The Foundation for Social Welfare confirmed that the orphanage in question, one of the very few that ever accepted singles’ applications, took on the instructions de facto.

On 2nd February, 2012, The Foundation for Social Welfare said “Ethiopia’s laws do not refuse adoptions by Maltese single parents. However, the contact through which Maltese are adopting in Ethiopia is currently accepting couples only."

I chose to write about this subject again because the subject is very close to my heart and it’s very important for me to clear out some things:

1.       I’m not in any way trying to diminish the great work being done by the orphanage itself. The people who run the orphanage on a daily basis do a brilliant job, but have absolutely no say in such policies. The order came from Malta.

2.       This is not Church bashing in any way. I cannot justifiably point fingers at anyone else but the issuer of the informal instruction, and that was The Maltese Curia

3.       The Curia was contacted by this paper. The journalist asked for a reason for this decision but the Curia’s spokesperson decided not to answer the ‘why’ question.

4.       As rightly reported by this paper, in my previous blog, I alluded that the reason for the Curia’s decision to stop all single adoptions was in fact a roundabout way to stop gay adoptions. This is my opinion, which though based on secure information, remains simply my opinion which was not (and probably never will be) confirmed by The Church.

5.       Though the demand for adoptable infants is much bigger than the supply, when it comes to older children (over four especially) the tables turn and the supply is bigger than the demand, so stopping single adoptions will in fact result in these children remaining in orphanages.

6.       When a few years ago the law stated that married couples had to have been married for three years or more before applying for adoption, Dr. Marco Cremona fought tooth and nail to get this discriminatory law overturned, and he managed.

7.       Dr. Cremona’s successful argument was that since single people don’t have to wait for anything to start the adoption process, then it is discriminatory to impose such a restriction on married people. But now, that the tables have turned, and the discrimination is against singles, we are being told to lie low because we might jeopardise Ethiopian adoptions all together i.e. Ethiopia might decide to stop all Malta adoptions, including adoptions for married couples.

8.       I do not in any way wish to enter a debate as to whether single people and/or homosexuals are as capable of bringing up children as married people are. To my mind there are good parents and there are bad parents, and it has absolutely nothing to do with whether they are married, single, gay or straight.

9.       It is not up to The Church to decide! To date Maltese and Ethiopian law allows single people to adopt. So, even though the orphanage is in Ethiopia, and is run by the Maltese Church, since the instructions were issued from Malta, The Maltese Church should be held liable for discrimination.

10.   And finally, the adoption process falls under Malta’s civil law. The Church has a right to an opinion, it also has a right to voice it, but going round the law in this hush hush way is wrong wrong wrong!