June 25, 1999

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June

Volume

8

25,

t

¥

&

1999

Number 39

Serving Catholics

Inside

Herald ...Page

3

New priest assignments

WEAVERVILLE Children and adults played volleyball or strolled on the green grass around the weathered barn or fished in a nearby pond. Parents shepherded gurgling toddlers eager to explore on legs new to walking.

...Page

3

Not a family reunion but a reunion of families. Some 250 people had come to the Claxton Farm, near Weaverville, from such places as Atlanta, Ga.; Mobile,

Slowing the fast track: Cardinals propose bishops stay put

...Page

Ala.; Alexandria, Va.; Indianapolis, In.,

7

Greensboro, Charlotte and Asheville, N.C.; to enjoy a picnic

Local News Church welcomes new

members through RCIA

to

12-13

grounded

in a

shared experience the parents were Americans, the children were natives of Russia and China. The International Adoption Program, sponsored by Catholic Social Services of the Charlotte Diocese, and administered out of CSS's Western Regional Office in Asheville, had made the miracles possible. Parents had achieved "the dream of a lifetime," as Robert Boggs wrote in a letter to the

CSS

CSS Hand

office in Charlotte.

Boggs and

his wife, Denise,

who

live in Alexandria, are typical

Hand program

who

parents

...Page

16

fvery Week Editorials

the Diocese of Charlotte

By JOANITA M. N ELLEN BACH Correspondent

Catholic News

State honors

in

to international adoption program

staff of The

...Pages

Western North Carolina

CSS lends services, essential spirit

Writer joins

&

in

& Columns ...Pages

4-5

Entertainment Pages 10-11

of the avail themselves of the

International Adoption Program. They had found their best route to adoption by going to another country. The Boggs started with a private nonprofit agency in Washington, D.C., but things didn't work out. "We contacted Catholic Social

Photo by Joanita M. Nellenbach

A

dandelion intrigues Grace Kohrs, now 19 months old. She came home from Russia Dec. 23 with her new parents, Kathy (holding her) and Richard Kohrs of Hickory, N.C. tell them apart. "We put them facing each other on the couch,

sister,

Services in North Carolina (Asheville)

and their eyes

based on an excellent article written in

for

my

ment," Boggs said at the picnic.

contact with Lois Miller (the International Adoption coordinator in Atlanta) and

company's newspaper by a very satisfied couple who had adopted a little boy from Russia," Boggs wrote. They worked with Carol wife's

Meyerriecks, the International Adoption coordinator in the Asheville CSS office, to complete the necessary pa-

perwork and home study. In December, the lAP offered them the chance to adopt twin girls who had been born the previous August. They immediately accepted, and in April traveled to

Moscow

to see the children.

first visit with Anna and was emotional. "We were just crying," Boggs said at the picnic. "We couldn't believe how great they

Their

Irina

looked." first

Meeting their new parents for the time was also an eye-opener, of

sorts, for the babies,

kept

in

who had been

separate cribs so hospital per-

sonnel could

and they reached each other; that was a neat molit

up,

Emma, is 18 months old. "We knew we wanted two

dren,"

Marlene

said.

"Our

chil-

first

we felt so comthem we never considered going anywhere else."

Anna and Irina, renamed Glenna Roberta and Natalie Alyene in honor of their new American grandmothers, were kicking and cooing in their portable playpen and smiling at all the admiring looks from parents whose own stories were similar to the Boggs'. Over by the pond, Aaron Kohrs, 5, was fishing while his mother, Kathy, watched over Russian-born 19month-old Grace, blowing the seeds off" dandelions nearby. Kathy and her husband, Richard, had adopted Aaron, born in this country, through CSS in

she had wanted to parent her own youngsters. "I had always wanted children, but never found the person I wanted to spend the rest of my life with," she

Charlotte.

said.

"I

trust CSS,"

Kathy

said. "It

must

be wonderful to know you're a part of getting all these children homes." Marlene and Jim Sidon of Atlanta also adopted two children through the lAP. Nikolai is now 2 l/2; his new

Carol Meyerriecks

fortable with

Jim said

his greatest joy has been,

"Just seeing the changes in the chil-

dren.

It's

such a blessing having the

two of them. We're so Clara Brunk also

fortunate." feels fortunate.

Principal of a school in Mobile, Ala.,

Through lAP she is the mother of Dawson Eugene, now 11, and

Vasily

Vladimer Ethan Ross, now 6, whom she adopted last summer. Clara said

See

adoption

PICNIC, page

15


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