Abebe Fantahun, Director of Lola Children’s Home
Abebe feels a calling to help kids in the same predicament. Working as a social worker at one of Addis Ababa’s only HIV-positive orphanages, he felt a specific commitment to children with HIV. He decided to return to his birthplace in Mekelle and serve the local children as the founder and director of Lola Children’s Home.
In 2009, Lola Children’s Home began as an orphanage for children affected by HIV. It quickly grew to encompass children from the community, and its mission was redefined. Instead of simply housing children, it would care for orphans in addition to assisting local families.
“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”