Via Zoe Romanowsky at Inside Catholic, a link to an article written by Emily Stimson on a Stuebenville grad. Zoe’s summary:
Eighteen months later, after graduation, Shannon began to pray about her desire to work in a Chinese orphanage. She immediately received — and I mean immediately (ten minutes later) — a phone call from a friend, offering her the opportunity she’d been praying for. Four weeks later, she was on China’s east coast, working for a small, privately run orphanage. “She was the only American, the only English speaker and the only Catholic,” writes Stimpson.
It was overwhelming in many ways and included an experience with a baby named Max, who arrived with a cleft palate and couldn’t drink from a bottle. Although the staff advised her to let him be, Shannon believed God wanted Max to live so she fed him from a dropper and he slept with her at night. He grew healthy and strong enough for surgery. And he survived.
After a couple of years, she returned home to the U.S. to recover and rest. Then she went back to work for ChinaCare Foundation in Beijing, which primarily took in special needs babies who had been abandoned.
The orphanage had a problem. Some of the children were beyond help and were simply going to die. The orphanage questioned the wisdom of keeping them since their beds could be used for children in better shape. They considered sending the dying kids back to the state.
Shannon knew what that would mean: Terrible conditions for the babies, who would end up dying alone. So she proposed a solution: She would open a home for these children. Through the generous donations of friends and fellow FUS alumni, she raised enough money to open the doors of Loving Heart Home in February 2007. Soon, with some new renovations, they’ll be able to accommodate 20 babies.
From the Loving Heart Home website:
Loving Heart is a special place to provide comfort, love, and care to orphans who are dying. It is a home filled with love and joy.
Since opening our doors on February 1, 2007, we have taken in 23 children. There are currently 11 in our home, 2 have “graduated” out of hospice care and are receiving medical care in other facilities, and 10 have gone Home to our Heavenly Father.
Although it is difficult to watch a little one suffer and die, we consider it a privledge to be able to care for these children. To fill their short lives with love and happiness is our goal. One staff member, when asked why she does this work, responded, “If I were dying, I would want someone to be with me, to love me, to care for me. These children deserve no less.”
You can meet the children who are being so lovingly cared for on the website. And you can help:
China Little Flower operates under the generosity of its donors. If you would like to make a donation to help us in our work, please send a check to:
China Little Flower
7644 Edmonson Drive
Newburgh, IN 47630
Please pray for our ministry and those who serve with us!
This is a really incredible story — so young and so determined to serve. May God continue to give this young woman the strength to continue her work.
Thanks for posting this – great to read it
Wow! This entry should have a warning attached. After reading and clicking through to the links, I started crying at work….
Will give and will get some Manchu relatives to give. This time I wrote the address down immediately unlike a previous time. I will annoy those closest to me……some things never change. We have one little China doll who plays congas with me and two mixed Korean-Irish dolls in the extended clan right now. I will push this address. This Shannon may be in the history books one day as a 21st century saint…gets an answer in ten minutes…..whew…talk about sacral moments in life….and the inbreaking of the Divine.
I was doing OK until I reached the last photo on the memorial page. My son owns a set of pajamas exactly the same as the one that little boy was wearing in the photo.
Thank God for Shannon, and people like her.