Illinois Pledges Changes…Again
We have all heard the stories and they hurt us every single time as avoidable. A young child is found dead and it should have never happened. All the warning signs were there, but they were ignored and a child pays for the actions of a system, bureaucracy, and people who take advantage of the most vulnerable members of society.
This story coming out of Chicago has been national news. The story involves a young man named Andrew “AJ” Freund who went missing and then was found in a shallow grave. AJ is the third child to die while in the Department of Children and Family Services since February. Read that again. Three children since February have died while in State care.
There was a doctors note about abuse and AJ being hit with a belt. AJ was seen with bruises and let us not forget, he was borne with opiates in his system. Story’s like AJ’s are the logical result of the State getting involved in parenting and child care. AJ should be alive today.
Guess what will happen? The DCFS in Chicago will receive more money, hire more bureaucrats, and create more systems and paperwork and hoops to jump through, but none of it will solve the problem. DCFS is not part of the solution, it is part of the problem.
A. Drug usage by parents is part of the problem, their proposed solutions will not curb this.
B. The bureaucracy is part of the problem, creating even more of it will not save future kids, but will almost assuredly result in them being placed in greater risk.
C. Having a system that needs bad families and risky children to thrive and grow ensures more bad families and risky children because the incentive is to get more, not correct the morally corrupt elements hurting children.
D. Non-State elements that could step in and at least work to solve this problem (like churches and para-ecclesial bodies) will remain on the outside looking in because they lack the ability to remove the existing lawfare (
I want us all to pray that children like AJ never run afoul of the DCFS in Illinois again. Christians have the capacity and ability to step inside this issue and make a difference, but people will have to agree that Christians have a moral imperative to aid children and hurting families through the love of Jesus and then be willing to stand in front of the State to remove this power from it.
Barring the above change and/or a worldwide change in behavior and belief, the AJ’s of the world will continue suffering. We can do better, but the State cannot.
