Shared Journey: Can Muslims Adopt?

Faisal Kutty, an assistant professor at Valparaiso University School of Law in Indiana and an adjunct professor at Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto, is among the growing number of Muslim scholars arguing for the reform of Islamic Adoption Laws in order to facilitate the adoption of children in a way that also upholds Islamic principles. Mr. Kutty's passion for this issue began during his travels in countries such as India and Pakistan where he saw the plight of Muslim orphans first hand. He has also been driven by the desire of his peers who, due to childlessness, are interested in pursuing the option of adopting a child to build their families. “I'm arguing for reform of these laws because if you look at the Qur'an and Sunnah it places a lot of emphasis on child welfare, child protection, and the best interest of the child,” Mr. Kutty explains.  He has argued that Islamic jurisprudence does allow for a form of adoption, kafalah (guardianship).  However, for a variety of reasons, these practices are not widely followed in Muslim majority countries, leaving many children who have been orphaned by war or abandoned by their parents without a “forever family”.

Debbie Hoffman is a Service Director with the Children's Aid Society of Ottawa who oversees Kin and Adoption. She is involved with the organization's efforts to become more inclusive of diversity and to work within an anti-oppressive framework. With initiatives in partnership with Muslim Families Services of Ottawa (MFSO), such as CAS Friends and the Shared Journey Project, Ms. Hoffman hopes to be able to make Muslims more aware of the many alternatives to closed adoption that exist.

One of these options is a kin arrangement. This is when a member of the child's family or ethno-cultural/religious community is found who can take the child in while whatever issues that may have made it necessary to remove the child from their parents are being resolved. CAS is involved in facilitating such arrangements with children who are at risk of being taken into the care of the CAS or who are already in care of the CAS.  “For the Children's Aid Society,” Ms. Hoffman explained, “there are two issues, first is safety and second is permanency. We would be okay with the child being in foster care or in a kin arrangement that has no legal footing only for a certain period of time. Eventually, you would either want the child to return to their parents or, if that is not possible, for the caregiver to take legal custody.”

Legal custody may be in line with Islamic principles as it does not terminate the parental rights of the child's parents nor is the child required to take the name of the guardian who has legal custody of them. Another possible option that could be in line with Islamic principles is an open adoption, which, in contrast to a closed adoption, does not automatically mean that the child loses all contact with their birth parents. The degree of contact and communication between the birth family and the child can be negotiated with the adoptive family. {sidebar id=33}

Faisal Kutty admits that there are other tensions within Islamic jurisprudence that will need to be addressed in order to fully resolve the reservations of Muslim jurists regarding adoptions. These include concerns around inheritance and gender-based privacy boundaries between people who are not blood relatives. “We need dialogue on this. We need to go back to the sources. This is now about securing the safety and livelihood of Muslim children,” Mr. Kutty emphasized.

Locally and globally Muslim children are searching for their “forever family”. This November, CAS hopes you will consider if this family just might be yours.

To learn more about fostering and adoption visit CAS Ottawa's website:

http://www.casott.on.ca/