Hope Haven provides a safe home for the children of South Mississippi who have been removed from their caregivers due to substantial abuse or neglect. The kids at Hope Haven have been raped, beaten, sodomized, starved, locked up or forgotten about. Abused children grow up into abusers without appropriate intervention. Hope Haven focuses on providing that intervention while also taking care of the children's immediate needs. Without a local shelter, kids are sent hundreds of miles away to where ever there is an open bed. They are taken out of school, away from appropriate family members and friends and put in a strange place, with locked doors, bars on the windows and barbwire fences . . . these children have done nothing wrong. Hope Haven keeps them safe and helps them from being victimized again by the 'system' meant to help them. The staff at Hope Haven is restricted from directly questioning a child about the particulars that led the child to be in the shelter. The staff isn't there to question or second guess the children. They are there to provide unconditional love and acceptance that these kids need. There are no pat answers in the area of abuse and neglect. There are some easy conclusions . . . children need love, they need stability, they need praise, they need acceptance, they need rules and a moral compass to steer by, they need love. Oh how simple, oh how hard.