Children abandoned as Morocco deports adoptive parents
Children abandoned as Morocco deports adoptive parents
Published: 16 March 2010 09:30 | Changed: 17 March 2010 09:00
Last week, Morocco deported a large number of Christians on suspicion
of proselytizing.
By Gert van Langendonck in Rabat
Their only crime, Herman Boonstra said, was letting children read from
a children’s Bible. “Stories of Noah and the Ark and Jonas and the
whale. Stories that appear in the Koran as well.”
Last week, Boonstra and 15 other people working at the Village of Hope
orphanage in Ain Leuh, a town in the Moroccan Atlas Mountains, were
booted out of the country for suspected proselytizing. Elsewhere in
Morocco, Christians were also deported, including a “significant”
number of Americans, the US embassy reported.
Maxime Verhagen, the Dutch acting minister of foreign affairs,
immediately summoned the Moroccan ambassador to protest the
deportation of Boonstra and six other Dutch people. Confessional
parties have asked questions about the matter in the Dutch parliament.
33 children abandoned anew
On Friday evening, Boonstra and the other adoptive parents from the
Village of Hope appealed to the Moroccan king to “to act with mercy
and help us reach a point of compromise and reunite the 33 children
with the only parents they know,” Village of Hope’s website said.
For Herman and Jellie Boonstra, their deportation is a personal drama.
They had come to see the eight children they had taken in as their
own. The Village of Hope was not an everyday orphanage. Here, children
were adopted into real families. The Village was home to 33 children
in all, mostly abandoned by women who had become pregnant out of
wedlock. “They were our children; now suddenly they aren’t anymore,”
an emotional Boonstra said, speaking on the phone from Spain.
The proposition was risky to begin with: adoption is illegal in Muslim
countries. Something resembling it is allowed, a practice called
kafala in Arabic, but Christians are not eligible.
On the other hand, early this year Village of Hope was officially
recognised as a children’s care facility, which made the deportation
an even bigger surprise, Boonstra said. “We have always tried to be
clear. They knew exactly who we were and have not interfered with us
one bit for ten years. Now, suddenly they are treating us like
criminals and having us carried off under police escort.”
Practice, don't preach
Responding to the criticism, the Moroccan minister of communication,
Khalid Naciri, announced that Morocco would “continue to take stern
action against everyone belittling religious values.” According to
Naciri, Christians are free to practice their religion in Morocco, but
proselytizing will not be tolerated.
The minister of justice had earlier stated that the deported
foreigners had exploited the poverty of a number of Moroccan families
to convert minors to Christianity. In a joint statement, the Catholic
and evangelical churches of Morocco distanced themselves from the
deported Christians. Converting people in a relatively weak position
is a “deplorable practice,” according to the churches.
Jack Wald III, an American reverend with the protestant Rabat
International Church, said the deportations were indicative of a
policy shift in the government. Deportations of Christians are nothing
new in Morocco, “but we considered the deportations in 2009 as
anomalies,” said Wald, who was chairman of the Village of Hope’s board
until 2008. “This is different; this seems to be a coordinated
effort.”
Morocco has taken stern measures against Shia Muslims in the past, as
it has against Salafi and other strains of the Muslim faith at odds
with the official Moroccan variety of Islam: Sunni Malikism.
he Boonstra's and their adopted children. Photo Village of Hope website
Children abandoned as Morocco deports adoptive parents
Published: 16 March 2010 09:30 | Changed: 17 March 2010 09:00
The Moroccan constitution guarantees religious freedom, but Islam is
the official state religion and converting people to another one is
punishable under the law.
“The way it was done has been traumatic for the children: they have
been abandoned a second time,” said Wald. “It was a shameful act on
the part of the Moroccan authorities. What they're saying is that the
perceived threat from Christianity trumps the welfare of these
children."
Boonstra said he never intended to convert the children in his care.
“Of course they are more familiar with Christianity since they grew up
with us, but they got Koran lessons all the same. We have always tried
to make everything as Moroccan as possible. We have never held a
grudge against Muslims and still don’t. We have tried to uphold the
Dutch standard of care in Morocco, to show that things don’t have to
be the way they are in the official Moroccan orphanages, where
children have to share their beds with two others.”