Adoption by Priests

[Anicette]

It seems an interesting plot.

Not sure that it is very realistic, but why not.

Yes, this priest will lack child-rearing experience. And also a wife to educate properly the child. And youthness.
He could have had more rigid education than today, and be very psychorigid with the child. It can create an interesting gap.
And also his parstoral duties will makes him enable to care for the child most of the day. An other older woman, such as his housekeeper or a sacristan could be ask to help on regular basis.

I remerber a pastor who testimony that he was sent regularly to his psychorigid great-oncle priest during the summer. The priest accept the as a burden, because the parents do not let him a choice. He has no child experience, and do not know how to deal with a little 5 years old boy. He set rules, such as no kiss allowed and a distance between the boy and him. And basically he discharges himself from the child care to his sacristan.

 

[babochka]

It is a sort of cliché.
Then thoses children who cannot find a home are often special needs, ill children, children with trauma, children with a lot of siblings, older children. A single person will not necessary be better armed to deal with that.

Not necessary better armed. Sometimes it is a matter of being more willing to expand beyond the ideal. Cliche or not, that was my experience in 15 years of working as a social worker in foster care and adoptions. Maybe it has changed now that there is not an automatic preference for a heterosexual, married couple.

 

[EqualinHim]

That’s an interesting take. I envisioned this character as very loving and very involved with his extended family. But involvement with your extended family is very different than raising and caring for a child on a day-to-day basis. I’m not going to make him completely rigid but rigid in some areas. Her teen years are going to be interesting. Also it’d be interesting to see him balance her needs and the parish’s needs. I think a hypothetical issue would happen when she needs a ride home from school but has to walk home when he forgets and she’s forced to walk home alone, and sit outside in the rain or something like that. Another situation that could happen is a fight over her staying out too late.

 

[Anicette]

That’s a very good idea.

Yes, you have right, if you make the priest, who is a main caracter completly rigid, he will be antipatethic for the public, and they will reject him.

But why if is mainly a man who is embarassed, modest in front of a child that he has now under his home?
He is an old man who has lived always as celibate and consecrated for the church. And at 60 years old, 70 years ago, you are older than now. He is completly unprepared for this challenge. More in thoses times, men will not carry for their little children. It’s up to their mother. Then, to add, the child is a girl. And he know nothing about little girls.
He will have all night, weekend… And when she will become teenager, and developped as a woman, it can brings new challenges to. He is a very old man, now, too.

Is my thinking is close to your, or you envisionned the things differently?

 

[EqualinHim]

You’ve given me so many ideas. I can picture it playing out in my head: the priest hands the housekeeper a bunch of money and refuses to go clothes shopping with his niece. I think that, despite the initial struggles, they eventually become very close. She is a joy and help to him as she grows up under his roof. Another thing is that these particular characters are dealing with the loss of their entire family. Out of their once huge network of extended family members, they are quite possibly the only ones left. And anti-semitism becomes a problem because the child’s father has Jewish ancestry and people tease her for it. They might be scared of having a deep relationship with one another as a result of the grief which would make the dynamics even more interesting.

 

[Anicette]

Great, the first idea is a very realistic one!

The child had a father of Jewish ancestry, so Jewish rel name, I suppose. But if her mother was’nt Jewish she is not considered as Jewish by Jewish community.

(Rules are certainly not the same for the italian administration, but I do not known them).

 

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

For sure many priests would make great models for moral character but I can see how sometimes priestly obligations would interfere with child-rearing/guardianship so I understand why cases like this are pretty rare. A priest has to be 100% available all the time, and having a kid would make that very difficult. In the story I envisioned writing, the priest ends up taking care of his five year old great-niece because the parents, grandparents, and godparents are all dead or missing as a result of the war. The priest is in his 60s and the kid is a 5 to 6 year old girl. The story is kind of an emotional roller coaster due to large amounts of comedy and tragedy that afflict this pair. Add to the fact that the girl’s father was of Jewish ancestry, and so the priest has the additional burden of protecting her since it’s Italy in 1943 and she’s very likely to end up being gassed in a concentration camp if not for some very creative interventions that he puts into place to protect her and a couple of other kids. The tragedy of the setting and some of the plot events combined with an older man with no child-rearing experience suddenly being stuck with a five year old would make for an interesting emotional experience for the readers.

I mean, isn’t that a bit like Silas Marner?