Human babies are the most tender and weak of all the babies of living creatures. It, therefore, needs its parents' care and guidance for its physical and mental growth for a longer period. This is why nature has endowed parents with a special attraction for their offspring.

In the past, the separation of children from their parents was caused only by emergency situations-war or occasional premature death. In normal circumstances, it was taken for granted that the children would enjoy the protection of their parents for as long as they required it.

However, this exception has come to be a rule in modern, advanced societies. This is the outcome of the modern concept of life which has destroyed the sanctity of matrimony. Either the children are born out of wedlock or the couples get separated shortly after marriage. The result is one in both cases-alienation of children from their parents, because they are "orphaned" during the lifetime of their parents.

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The increasing incidence of this kind of orphaning is creating complex problems in modern society, one of which has been termed "Deprivation Dwarfism". The following are excerpts from a recent report by Western medical experts on this subject: - "Lack of love can stunt children's physical growth, retard their intellect or even kill them." Medical experts have called the affliction deprivation dwarfism, a disease that used to kill many children in orphanages. Pediatricians say that as late as 1915 some 90 per cent of the children who died in Baltimore, Maryland (the United States) orphanages within the first year of admission did so because of lack of love.

In deprivation dwarfism a child does not sleep properly and has trouble with his bowels. Just as the human body can become dwarfed, so can the human spirit. The only cure for this is the tender, loving care which is engendered by love. There is no substitute for it, and the greatest love of all is the love of God.