One of the first things I did after I left grad school and got a real job, was to sign up to be a sponsor with Save the Children. I’d always appreciated their philosophy of working with communities to become self-sufficient, and then moving on to the next challenge.
My first sponsored child was in Mali. Over the years, as children aged out of the program, or the organization moved on to other communities, the faces changed, but we remained connected to Mali. After about a decade we added a second sponsorship, this time a domestic program in the US.
When we relocated to Connecticut in 2016, one of the first orders of business was to register our kids for school. It was a bit of a surprise when we were told that the offices for enrollment were in ‘the Save the Children building.’ The town offices were in the upper floors of the building that housed the organization’s global headquarters in Fairfield, Connecticut. It was almost like a homecoming.
Save the Children is closely connected to the community in Fairfield. As such, it hit the town hard when on January 24, 2018, Islamic militants stormed the organization’s facility in Jalalabad, Afghanistan. The militants detonated bombs outside the building, and used an RPG to blow out the doors. In the end, six civilians were murdered, including three employees of Save the Children. Another twenty-seven were injured, including members of the Afghan security forces who responded and repelled the attack.
The sin committed by Save the Children to draw the ire of these Islamist militants was the heinous crime of teaching girls to read. For this, people were murdered.
It’s important to remember these stories, to remind ourselves that evil still exists, thrives even, in today’s world. That there are worldviews wholly opposed to our own, and people who are more than willing to kill anyone who thinks differently than them.
But, also to remind ourselves that goodness persists. Save the Children, along with many other organizations, has resumed operations in Afghanistan, as well as other areas where oppression exists. If you want to stand up to the terrorists, a good place to start would be helping a girl learn to read, educating boys and girls alike, and providing medical and educational assistance to isolated communities.
A simple search will lead you to multiple organizations that need your support. I would recommend reviewing the work that World Vision International is doing as a place to start.
https://www.wvi.org/afghanistan
The darkness cannot overcome the light. We need to support those that are on the front lines, the boots on the ground, that are taking the light into darkness.
P.A. Tennant – January, 2026
Soli Deo Gloria
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Photo: Associated Press
Copyright 2026 Paul A. Tennant
Substack: https://storyroad.substack.com/
Website: https://patennant.com/
P.A. Tennant 