Vacated

The judge thanked all of us who had been involved in the case and proclaimed, “Last week TK* turned 21 years of age. Therefore, this court no longer has jurisdiction in this matter and case number Jxx-xxxx is hereby vacated.” With a light tap of the gavel, TK instantly went from dependent of the county, with all the support that included, to independent adult with limited financial means, no prior experience, a minimal education, and inadequate job skills. And at that same instant, my role as his Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) was terminated.

A CASA is a volunteer who is appointed by a judge to advocate for a specific child that is currently in the foster care system. I never intended to become a CASA. In the fall of 2013, I accompanied Julie to an informational meeting one night because I didn’t want her to have to go alone. I had been perfectly content in my ignorance. I had a full-time job and was way too busy to get involved. I came up with all kinds of excuses; “I don’t have time”, “I have no natural gifts in this area”, “I’m the least compassionate person I know”, “I have the social skills of an engineer!”. Apparently, God had a different plan. James 1:27 kept going through my mind, “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” I became increasingly convinced that this isn’t just some theological concept that we sit around and thoughtfully nod in agreement on. This is a biblical command that requires direct action. So, I volunteered, went through the training, was sworn in, and eventually was appointed as TK’s CASA.

It turned out my concerns about my inadequacies were right. I was in way over my head. But TK didn’t need an expert, or natural gifts, or social skills. He just needed someone to be there. To show up when I said I would. To listen when he ranted. To treat him with dignity regardless of his choices and behaviors. To meet him where he was regardless of circumstances and to love him unconditionally. These are things that TK had never experienced before.

Over these past seven and a half years, I may have helped TK through some things, but TK taught me what it really means to be the hands and feet of Jesus. It’s messy, uncomfortable, frustrating, challenging, and at times it is seemingly hopeless. It’s through our own brokenness and inadequacies that we learn submission and to trust in Him. I’m becoming more and more convinced that the “abundant life” is the one in which we are fully dependent on Him on a daily and hourly basis.

During my time as a CASA I experienced many things that were far outside of my comfort zone. There was my visit to the juvenile detention facility, a criminal court hearing, being greeted at the door by a very large kid yelling, “What the f@$k do you want?” and watching a school administrator emotionally eviscerate a child in the most clinical terms before a large group of people as the child sat there silently and helplessly staring at the floor.

Childhood trauma has devastating consequences. Choices that result in short-term satisfaction will nearly always trump rational, long-term decisions. Fear is a constant presence. Anger burns continually, just below the surface, and when it is unleashed the results can be devastating. The only tears I saw came when there was a “placement change”. Placement change is a mundane sounding euphemism that means that a child is forcibly removed from his current residence and taken to a completely different living situation, with absolutely no input from the child.

Imagine coming home from school one day, noticing an old white van out in front of the house with County logos on the front doors, and as you walk in the door you find that all of your worldly belongings have been stuffed in plastic trash bags and a strange, smiling woman that you’ve never met before informs you that you’re being relocated to a “more appropriate home”. So, you’re driven over to a new group home in a different city and dropped off with your trash bags to live with a bunch of people you don’t know. That night you’ll spend a sleepless night in a bed that isn’t yours, under sheets that aren’t yours, with a roommate you’ve never met, anxiously thinking about starting over in a new school where you know no one.

Over the years I heard little fragments of memories. Painful glimpses of past trauma that continue to resonate and stir up emotions today. I suspect the memories only came in fragments because remembering the stories in their entirety was too terrible to contemplate.

It is appalling what human beings are capable of inflicting on their own children. The neglect, the physical abuse, the emotional abuse, and the sexual abuse. Children born with damaged brains and chemical addictions so that the first things they experience are debilitating chemical withdrawal symptoms and life-long disabilities. Children left alone for days in a filthy home, with no food, while mom is off on a drug addled bender. Alcoholic fathers that take out their frustrations by physically beating their kids. Children subjected to unimaginable acts of perversion by sociopaths who will do anything to satisfy their depraved sense of gratification.

Our child welfare system is society’s hidden crisis. The homelessness issue is all around us and if you live in the vicinity of a large city, you can’t miss it. But our child welfare system keeps these kids safely warehoused in institutional mental health facilities, group homes, with extended family, and individual foster care homes. I can assure you there are hundreds of kids living this out within a few miles of where you live right now. But, out of sight, out of mind.

Historically, the Church played a significant role in looking after orphans. Over the last century as the mythical concept of “separation of church and state” gained supremacy, that role has increasingly diminished. Today, there are some great ministries that work in the margins, but the Church has largely vacated the role it is called to fill to the secular solutions of local bureaucrats.

The government’s solution is to assign kids social workers who are supposed to ensure that between 30 and 35 kids are taken care of (and all their reems of paperwork are correctly filled out), place them in a home with an appropriate level of care for their needs, and provide a few hours of professional psychological counseling each month. Finding the home with the appropriate level of care isn’t always obvious, and may change over time, thus the need for the occasional “placement change” (and all the additional trauma that entails). At the age of either 18 or 21, depending on their circumstances, the dependency ends, and these kids are turned out in the streets and left to their own devices to figure out how to function as an adult in society. It typically turns out about as well as you would expect.

There are no social programs or any amount of government funding that will solve this problem. These kids need love, they need emotional connection, they need to have people in their lives that are worthy of their trust, and they need Jesus to heal that broken part of their soul that only He can reach. They need us to do what we have been called to do!

During my involvement in this ministry, I have met so many incredible people. Christians that have answered the call of James 1:27 and are in the trenches, fighting the battle daily. The harried looking dad in the back of church with the unruly kids. The mom that has to be called into the Sunday school class because one of the kids is just too disruptive today. The family that hasn’t made it to church for the last three weeks because they couldn’t quite wrangle everyone into the car on time. These are the heroes among us that we don’t see.

They need our help. They need our support. They need us to be the Church.

* TK is "traumatized kid" - not his real name.