She was known as the “Mother Teresa of Africa” (Washington Post, August 10, 2021). Her name was Abebech Gobena, and her many contributions to her native Ethiopia included an orphanage, a hospital for women and children, schools, vocational training centers, and wells. She died on July 4, 2021, at age 85 from covid-19.

Ms. Gobena undertook her humanitarian work out of her deep Christian faith. More than 40 years ago, during a religious pilgrimage to a site in northern Ethiopia, she encountered many hungry, dying people “sprawled all over,” she told CNN in a 2010 interview. She found a woman who appeared to be sleeping, with her infant daughter nursing at her breast. Unable to wake her, and realizing that the woman had died, Ms. Gobena rescued the baby and took the child back with her to Addis Ababa. Such was the beginning of her efforts to take in orphans and provide services for people in desperate need. Using innovative fundraising, she was able to establish a nonprofit organization that would serve thousands of children with shelter, food, schooling, and vocational training.

In a statement, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director of the World Health Organization and a former Ethiopian minister of health, said, “Abebech Gobena was one of the most selfless and pure-hearted people I ever met. She helped many children not only survive, but succeed in life. Starting with two orphans she brought home during the famine in the 1880s, she grew a large family, even at times to the detriment of her own.”

What would prompt a woman like Abebech Gobena to devote her life to such selfless service? A key may be the pilgrimage that began it all. She had gone to Gishen Mariam, a site that contains what some believers regard as a piece of the cross on which Jesus died. Jesus had told his followers, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me” (Matthew 16:24; Mark 8:34; Luke 9:23; see also Matthew 10:38 and Luke 14:27). Abebech Gobena took up her cross and followed Jesus.