By Rosemary Miller, Exec. Director
Catholic Social Services of Montana

When Thanksgiving nears we know it is time to celebrate adoption and the gift of beautiful children joining their permanent family. For the last 11 years we have celebrated adoption in a special ceremony in the Capitol Rotunda in Helena.

We have been privileged to have the St. Andrew’s School choir sing at the celebration for all of the 11 years and they will be singing again this year. They sing a special song to each of the children, individually who are being adopted at the celebration. Their angelic voices bring tears to parents’ eyes as they sing to their child.

We invite you to join us in a public celebration of adoption on Nov. 25, 2008, at 2 p.m. at the Capitol Rotunda. Adoption Agencies in Helena and the surrounding communities join together to celebrate the families that have been created through adoption.

Refreshments will be served after the ceremony where four families will finalize the adoption of their children. A single mother and her teenage daughter will talk about their adoption journey and then share the finalization of their adoption with all of us. The keynote speaker will captivate us with her story of searching for her son that she placed for adoption as a baby and finding him as an adult to meet and rejoin his birth family.

November is National Adoption Awareness Month and celebrations are occurring all over our nation as families finalize their adoptions in a public setting.

Other Montana celebrations have occurred in Great Falls and Billings earlier this month. For more information about adoption, call Catholic Social Services of Montana, 442-4130 or 1-800-222-9383.


Published in The Montana Catholic, Vol. 24, No. 11, November 21, 2008.