It Doesn't Take the Cleavers, But...

When the loving bond between parent and child is healthy, the duties of the community, or of the "village," are negative ones--to stay out of the way and to keep others out of the way. But to the extent that that loving bond has failed--whether by proving unduly strong or yet tragically weak--only then is the "village" to the same extent necessary in order to support the parental role and to "raise" the child. But it is the rarest exception when an adult, particularly a paid worker, can provide sufficient love to a child to even partially replace the bond that has failed.