Positive Steps to Confront Stereotypes

In recent blogs I talked about anti-immigrant feeling in America today and whether it will have an unintended impact on our adopted children. I was thinking primarily of our Asian and Latino children, but a third-grader from Ethiopia was recently taunted in my neighborhood and told to go back to her country. In some parts of the U.S. the immigrant African population may be larger than the African-American population, so possibly more and more people will assume that African-heritage children are immigrants as well. And some of them are—Haiti and Liberia have been native countries of significant numbers of adopted … Continue reading

Racism, Current Events, and Halloween History

Not many people know what Halloween meant to the early Celtic Christians of Ireland. I knew that the name “Hallow-even” meant “eve of All Hallows (All Saints’ Day), a feast day still celebrated by many Christian denominations. I knew that one of the origins of trick-or-treating was the custom of children holding lanterns (perhaps made of hollowed-out squash with a candle inside) and going from house to house offering prayers for the dead. The homeowners then served “soul cakes”. I’m not exactly sure what those were, but that fact may be why I always associate Halloween with doughnuts. That was … Continue reading