In this thought-provoking podcast episode, we delve into the intriguing concept of “The Gift of Disillusionment” as explored in a recent book co-authored by our guest, Peter Greer. Peter is president and CEO of HOPE International, a global Christ-centered micro-enterprise development organization serving throughout Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe. Don’t miss this captivating conversation that explores the profound perspective that disillusionment can be seen as a gift rather than a setback.

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This week we have the co-author of Freeing Congregational Mission, Dr. Hunter Farrell. He served as a long-term missionary in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Peru and now works as the Director of the World Mission Initiative at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. Dr. Farrell brings a wealth of first hand and research knowledge about Christian Mission. After 35 years in intercultural missions, he is calling for a reframing of missions. What would it look like to approach missions with a learning posture? How can we create spaces of connection for shared learning across cultures?

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In this Conversation episode, we’re joined by four child welfare leaders to dive into the nuances, challenges and triumphs of pioneering foster care throughout the world. On the show is Ian Forber-Pratt from Children’s Emergency Relief International, Tara Garcia from Identity Mission, Sebilu Bodja from Bethany Christian Services, and Martus Greyvenstein from Kin Culture. We’ll dive into all the nitty-gritty of foster care including questions like “Is foster-to-adopt bad?” “How do you promote something that is completely foreign in many contexts?” and “What role does foster care play in getting kids out of orphanages?”

In addition to the audio podcast, you can check out the video podcast on 1MILLIONHOME’s new YouTube channel – https://www.youtube.com/@1MILLIONHOMEofficial

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This week we have the privilege of delving deeper into the remarkable life story of Mohamed Emmanuel Nabieu. In his captivating memoir, Long Journey Back Home, Nabs shares his resilient spirit and unwavering determination to overcome the challenges that marked his childhood and youth. In his second appearance on Think Orphan, Nabs shares more powerful insights. Discover how he is harnessing the strength of his past to forge a path of empowerment, not only for himself but for countless others who have experienced similar adversity.

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This week we are joined by Tiffany Bluhm, the author of Prey Tell and Never Alone. She speaks at conferences, companies, and churches, and her work has been featured in Publisher’s Weekly, Sojourners, Red Letter Christians, the YouVersion Bible app, and more. She serves at the intersection of faith and culture, humor and women’s issues. In this episode, In addition to a heart-wrenching conversation on adoption, Tiffany helps us navigate hard conversations around abuse of power and what it means to create systems of accountability.

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This week, Jason Johnson from Christian Alliance for Orphans returns to the show. Jason is a writer and speaker who encourages families and equips church and organizational leaders on their foster care and adoption journeys. In this episode, Jason names and shares many of the struggles and challenges that foster and adoptive parents go through. He encourages us to find safe spaces and communities where we can process our emotions and have open and honest conversations.

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In episode 218, we hear from lawyer and professor, Elizabeth Kirk. Elizabeth is the Director of the Center for Law and the Human Person, as well as a research associate at The Catholic University of America. Her work spans a variety of law in child welfare, parental rights, and adoption policy. In addition to her career, her lived experiences as an adoptee and an adoptive parent, give her a unique perspective and voice to speak into the conversation happening around adoption today. She talks with Brandon about the role that infant adoption could play following last year’s Dobbs decision at the Supreme Court, misconceptions around adoption, as well as insight on the decision making process for women that have an unplanned pregnancy.

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In episode 216, we hear from US care reform leader, Sarah Winograd from Together for Families. Sarah speaks passionately about the complexities in child welfare and foster care as a system, how poverty contributes to family separation, and the problematic ways we’ve seen and judged birth families. She asks the hard questions- if most children aren’t coming into foster care because of abuse, what resources and systems are we investing in to keep those families together? What are we doing to intervene and stabilize families in order to prevent separation and keep children in families? Can the church do better?

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In episode 215, we have the privilege of sitting down with Jenn Hook to glean from her experiences in the foster care system and hear about her newly released book, Thriving Families. Jenn is the Founder and Executive Director of Replanted. She’s also the author of Replanted: Faith Based Support for Adoptive and Foster Families.

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In episode 208, we’re in conversation with author and preeminent attachment expert Deborah Gray. Deborah shares from her decades of experience serving children and families through therapy and sets baseline understandings on trauma and attachment. In addition to the stack of books that Deborah has written, she also shares about the Attachment-Trauma Focused Therapy post-graduate course that is now available for the first time ever in an online format. All that, plus we’ve got our favorite Brit, movie director and podcast editor, Samuel Rich, filling in for Phil this week. 

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