Exploring the joys, challenges of foster parenting
July 29, 2019 at 12:37 p.m.
By Rose O’Connor |Correspondent
“It’s the hardest job you’ll ever love,” Patti Simms, licensed clinical social worker and birth parent counselor for the Children’s Home of New Jersey, acknowledged during a Feb. 18 presentation on “Answering the Call to Care for Children” in St. Ann Parish, Lawrenceville.
Parishioner, Confirmation coordinator, special education teacher, mother of five and current foster mother, Donna Maccaroni, organized this information session as a way to inform and empower others about the call to become foster parents.
“The challenge of caring for God’s children is presented to us as Christians and Catholics. When considering respect for life issues, some of us are called to pray for unborn children, others are called to pray or care for the children who walk among us,” Maccaroni explained.
“I really believe that this is a great opportunity to inform people about this organization that is right in our backyard on South Clinton Avenue in Trenton. Children’s Home Society offers birth parent counseling that can begin during pregnancy, as well as options for foster care or adoption. They even offer short-term foster care for moms who need some time to get on their feet after the birth of their child.”
And the Children’s Home Society of New Jersey has been serving children in our area for more than 100 years.
Founded in 1894, the mission of the Children’s Home Society of New Jersey was to “find loving families for children, to protect children from harm, and to help parents find better ways to be parents so they can keep their children.”
Over a decade later, this mission is still at the heart of the services provided by the society for those who turn to them in a crisis.
For Maccaroni and her husband Gary, a pastoral associate in St. Ann Parish, the call to infant foster care “has been good for us as a family,” she shared as she soothed and fed her second and current foster child.
“It definitely has to be something the whole family is a part of,” she said, confessing that being an infant foster mother is “a part of who she is.”
Children’s Home Society staff, Valerie Fiorentino, foster care coordinator, and Patricia Faiola, a foster care specialist, answered questions from those in attendance about the Infant Foster Care of Medically Fragile Babies program, adoption and the additional free services provided by the society, a non-profit organization.
They also clarified misconceptions that are held about foster care as Fiorentino emphasized that the ultimate goal of foster care is the “reunification of the family.”
They also provided an explanation of the process and the support that is provided to foster families, including training, necessary supplies and the medical care that is needed to care for the infant or child.
While the Children’s Home Society of New Jersey is not a Catholic organization, Maccaroni believes that many Catholics are attracted to foster care because of its stance on respecting the dignity of the human person and respect of human life.
In a May 13, 2013 column that she wrote for America magazine, Maccaroni elaborated on her experiences and the graces she receives from serving as a foster parent and how her Catholic faith gives her the strength to deal with the pain of when it is time to let go of the child.
“I see these emotions – pain, suffering, wondrous joy – as evidence that God has called me as a Catholic, a Christian and, most of all, as a mother,” Maccacroni wrote in the article.
“When I was given the gift of motherhood, I received with it the grace necessary to understand that being a mother requires me not only to teach and serve, but also to let go and suffer loss,” she wrote.
“Without a prayer life or without a spiritual life, I would not be able to do this,” Maccaroni conferred at the Feb. 18 workshop, as she cradled her current temporary family member who will no doubt hold a permanent place in her heart.
For more information on Foster Care of Medically Fragile Babies or on The Children’s Home of New Jersey, visit www.chsofnj.org or contact Patricia Faiola (609) 695-6274 or by email [email protected].
To read Donna Maccaroni’s column that appeared in the May 13, 2013 edition of America magazine, visit: http://americamagazine.org/issue/child-god.
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By Rose O’Connor |Correspondent
“It’s the hardest job you’ll ever love,” Patti Simms, licensed clinical social worker and birth parent counselor for the Children’s Home of New Jersey, acknowledged during a Feb. 18 presentation on “Answering the Call to Care for Children” in St. Ann Parish, Lawrenceville.
Parishioner, Confirmation coordinator, special education teacher, mother of five and current foster mother, Donna Maccaroni, organized this information session as a way to inform and empower others about the call to become foster parents.
“The challenge of caring for God’s children is presented to us as Christians and Catholics. When considering respect for life issues, some of us are called to pray for unborn children, others are called to pray or care for the children who walk among us,” Maccaroni explained.
“I really believe that this is a great opportunity to inform people about this organization that is right in our backyard on South Clinton Avenue in Trenton. Children’s Home Society offers birth parent counseling that can begin during pregnancy, as well as options for foster care or adoption. They even offer short-term foster care for moms who need some time to get on their feet after the birth of their child.”
And the Children’s Home Society of New Jersey has been serving children in our area for more than 100 years.
Founded in 1894, the mission of the Children’s Home Society of New Jersey was to “find loving families for children, to protect children from harm, and to help parents find better ways to be parents so they can keep their children.”
Over a decade later, this mission is still at the heart of the services provided by the society for those who turn to them in a crisis.
For Maccaroni and her husband Gary, a pastoral associate in St. Ann Parish, the call to infant foster care “has been good for us as a family,” she shared as she soothed and fed her second and current foster child.
“It definitely has to be something the whole family is a part of,” she said, confessing that being an infant foster mother is “a part of who she is.”
Children’s Home Society staff, Valerie Fiorentino, foster care coordinator, and Patricia Faiola, a foster care specialist, answered questions from those in attendance about the Infant Foster Care of Medically Fragile Babies program, adoption and the additional free services provided by the society, a non-profit organization.
They also clarified misconceptions that are held about foster care as Fiorentino emphasized that the ultimate goal of foster care is the “reunification of the family.”
They also provided an explanation of the process and the support that is provided to foster families, including training, necessary supplies and the medical care that is needed to care for the infant or child.
While the Children’s Home Society of New Jersey is not a Catholic organization, Maccaroni believes that many Catholics are attracted to foster care because of its stance on respecting the dignity of the human person and respect of human life.
In a May 13, 2013 column that she wrote for America magazine, Maccaroni elaborated on her experiences and the graces she receives from serving as a foster parent and how her Catholic faith gives her the strength to deal with the pain of when it is time to let go of the child.
“I see these emotions – pain, suffering, wondrous joy – as evidence that God has called me as a Catholic, a Christian and, most of all, as a mother,” Maccacroni wrote in the article.
“When I was given the gift of motherhood, I received with it the grace necessary to understand that being a mother requires me not only to teach and serve, but also to let go and suffer loss,” she wrote.
“Without a prayer life or without a spiritual life, I would not be able to do this,” Maccaroni conferred at the Feb. 18 workshop, as she cradled her current temporary family member who will no doubt hold a permanent place in her heart.
For more information on Foster Care of Medically Fragile Babies or on The Children’s Home of New Jersey, visit www.chsofnj.org or contact Patricia Faiola (609) 695-6274 or by email [email protected].
To read Donna Maccaroni’s column that appeared in the May 13, 2013 edition of America magazine, visit: http://americamagazine.org/issue/child-god.
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