Europe

2022-01-14 00:00:00

Background

Europe is a continent of an estimated 741 million people. In Eastern Europe, residential care remains a common solution for orphans and vulnerable children. There are an estimated 7.3 million orphans living in Eastern Europe. Though Western Europe does not have the same challenges with residential care, the number of children in foster care or at risk of going into the system is significant. Europe still has the highest numbers of children separated from their families worldwide.

The Challenges:

Children without parental or family care may end up in an orphanage or group home.
More training programs are needed for families in crisis as well as for preparing foster and adoptive families to receive children.

Europe Without Orphans works to:

Equip national leaders to collaborate in solving their country’s orphaned and vulnerable children crisis
Build new national movements in all nations of Europe
End the institutionalization of children through lobby and advocacy campaigns
Strengthen crises families to prevent family-child separation and support foster and adoptive through trainings and support programs
Engage churches to support families and promote adoption.

2022-01-14 00:00:00

Countries with National Initiatives

Albania Without Orphans

Albania is a country in Southeast Europe. Until the early 90’s religion was completely forbidden in Albania. It was considered the only atheist country in the world. Since then the churches have been active again and the evangelical churches have grown from almost none to over 17,000.

Belarus Without Orphans

The Republic of Belarus is a small former Soviet nation in Europe with a population just under 10 million. In 2008, Belarus was a nation that got hit pretty severely in the global economic crisis. Because of this economic downturn there are approximately 25,000 orphans in Belarus.

Bulgaria Without Orphans

Bulgaria is a Balkan nation with diverse terrain encompassing Black Sea coastline, a mountainous interior and rivers, including the Danube.

Croatia Without Orphans

Croatia is a member of the EU and is located by the Adriatic Sea in Central and Southeast Europe. Tourism is a significant source of revenue, with Croatia ranked among the 20 most popular tourist destinations. Croatia’s population is 90% Christian.

DACH – Germany, Austria and Switzerland

Despite the relative wealth in the countries, there are still too many children who cannot grow up in a family environment; most of them live in institutions.

Egypt Without Orphans

Egypt is a transcontinental country located in the northeast corner of Africa. Egypt has one of the longest histories of any country. Modern Egypt dates back to 1922 when it gained independence from the British Empire.

Finland

Finland has been part of the European Union since 1995. Finland is a largely secular society, even though Christians number 84% of the population. 90% look with favour on the Church’s social work, but only 8% consistently attend any kind of religious service.

France

France is a leading member of the European Union. It faces many societal challenges, from caring for the increasingly ageing population, to inter-racial conflict. France is a strongly secular country where it is forbidden to practice or express one’s faith in the arenas of public service. Spirituality is seen as a private matter and less than 8% of the population attend a church of any kind and it is suggested that over 30% of people state they are non-religious.

Israel

Israel, a Middle Eastern country on the Mediterranean Sea, is regarded by Jews, Christians and Muslims as the biblical Holy Land.

Latvia Without Orphans

Latvia is a small country of only 2 million people, located in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. There are thousands of orphans living in Latvia. The children need more support than ever due to the social and economic upheaval. Latvia is among the poorest nations in the European Union, and the health care system is one of the worst in Europe. HIV/AIDS affects about 10,000 people in the country. Children under the age of 14 account for about 13.5% of the population in Latvia. Families are forced to move around due to economic stress, and children are left with people who cannot take care of them and ultimately end up in state-run institutions. The children then grow up and leave the institution unprepared for living on their own.

Romania Without Orphans

Romania is a located in South Eastern Europe and has a population of about 21.7 million people. There are about 100,000 orphans living in child protective services with more being abandoned each day.

Slovakia Without Orphans

Slovakia is a mountainous country in Central Europe. The country maintains a combination of a market economy with a comprehensive social security system, providing citizens with universal health care, free education, and one of the longest paid parental leaves.

Slovenia Without Orphans

Slovenia is located in Central Europe and has historically been at the crossroads of Slavic, Germanic, and Romance languages and cultures. In June 1991, Slovenia became the first republic to split from Yugoslavia and become an independent sovereign state.

Ukraine Without Orphans

Ukraine has a population of 43 million people, and 106,000 children live in boarding schools of various types (6,000 of whom are adoptable). Though in recent years Ukraine has made great strides in moving towards family care like foster care and adoption.

United Kingdom

Our vision is – a home for every child who needs one. When Home for Good launched as a charity in 2014, there were 9,000 foster carers urgently needed and approximately 6,000 children waiting to be adopted – and approximately 15,000 evangelical churches in the UK!

Regional Stories

From Trauma to Trust

At the beginning of October, a fruitful training event for Christian parents and children workers was organized in Helsinki. For one day about 40 participants joined either online or met face-to-face in a local church to network and receive training about trauma-informed care.

Family Weekend in Hungary

Numerous families suffer separation as a result of the war in Ukraine. This weekend was aimed at providing Ukrainian parents with a time of rest and relaxation and an opportunity to connect with other parents facing similar challenges.

Bulgarian Family Acts as Positive Role Model for Ending Orphanhood in Minorities

World Without Orphans Bulgaria started following the WWO Global Forum in 2019. Ivan Menchev and the WWO Bulgaria team and its partners are working tirelessly to strengthen families and to provide resources so that more children can be adopted and placed in loving families. The Atanasov family is one of the families that found joy in adopting a young Roma boy. Listen to their testimony as they share their story.

Update from Armenia

In June 2024, Barbara, our team member and trauma trainer travelled to Yerevan, the capital of Armenia. The goal of the trip was to join a first meeting with people interested in a Without Orphans movement and meet with a group of about 30 psychologists looking for trauma training.

First steps towards a national movement in Germany

When it comes to orphans and vulnerable children, we tend to think of countries in Eastern Europe or Africa. Yet in Germany, many children live in institutions or with short-term foster parents. The lack of long-term foster parents, social workers, as well as churches who understand their calling to help, were discussion points at the first roundtable toward a Without Orphans movement in Germany.

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