Compassion International partners with local churches to care for children’s minds, bodies and souls, helping them become all God created them to be. Child sponsorship is one key way we equip them for the work.
There are many ways to care for and build up children through Compassion, including donating to critical causes like disaster relief or giving life-changing gifts like Bibles from our Gift Catalog.
We also offer initiatives like Compassion Causes and Compassion Nurturers, where you can help fund critical needs for local church partners and the most vulnerable living in poverty.
Compassion: Helping Children Become Who God Made Them to Be
Millions of children live in poverty around the world. It’s our mission to release them from it by partnering with local churches to care for each child through their formative years — mind, body and soul — so they can overcome poverty and thrive as disciples of Jesus.
What does this look like? Each child has essential needs as they grow, some unique but all important. One child may need disaster relief. Another may need care after an injury. But every child needs the hope of the gospel, nutrition, medical care, protection and education to reach their God-given potential.
We’re committed to meeting each of these needs faithfully, until children grow into thriving adults. Child sponsorship helps us do that. But sponsorship isn’t the only way we care for children — and it’s far from the only way you can join us.
From specific causes that meet critical needs to philanthropic opportunities that maximize church impact, let’s explore other powerful ways you can partner with Compassion International to help children overcome poverty.
See how we care for the whole child in this guide: What Is Whole Child Development?
Causes for Children’s Critical Needs
Compassion offers various causes to donate to, each one meeting a critical need for children in the countries we serve. You can choose to donate to a cause once or even monthly to boost your impact.
Let’s explore some of these causes, the work we do and the impact you can help create through your support.
Disaster Relief
Every year, thousands of natural disasters happen around the world, from droughts to hurricanes. These disasters affect children in many ways. For example, an earthquake can leave them injured or without shelter, while flooding can raise their risk of waterborne diseases.
Through our Disaster Relief Fund, we help churches respond quickly after disaster so they can meet the needs of children affected. By donating to this cause, you equip them to provide food, clean water, safe shelter, medical care and even trauma counseling to help children heal in the aftermath of disaster.
Learn more about what disaster response looks like at Compassion.
Critical Program Needs
Children in poverty face countless unimaginable circumstances, from dangerous living conditions to deadly disease. Through the Critical Program Needs Fund, Compassion provides care for children facing crisis, from food and medication to safe water and education.
By donating to this cause, you help provide critical support wherever it’s needed the most.
Unsponsored Children
Child sponsorship provides the care children need as they grow, from nutrition support to education. At any given time, thousands of children are waiting for sponsors. In fact, on average, children wait three months for a sponsor.
However, through the Unsponsored Children Fund, churches can ensure that, as they wait, these children receive the same Christ-centered, consistent care as sponsored children do. Your donation to this cause equips them to do so.
Global Food Crisis
Countless children and their families are suffering from hunger around the world. According to the World Food Programme, around 266 million people are facing severe levels of food insecurity or a lack of nutritious food. Sadly, this leaves children vulnerable to malnutrition, which can lead to disease and even death.
Through the Global Food Crisis Fund, Compassion helps local churches support families impacted by the ongoing hunger crisis. Your donation will provide food packs, malnutrition monitoring and even medical care for children in need.
Other Causes Supporting Children in Need
These four causes are just a few of the ways Compassion intervenes on behalf of children living in poverty. Other causes you can support include:
Highly Vulnerable Children: Protection for those vulnerable to child abuse, exploitation, orphanhood, homelessness and human trafficking.
Medical Assistance: Treatment, emergency care and consistent screenings to protect children’s health and help them grow as God intended.
Child & Youth Education: Tuition support, school supplies and specialized education such as vocational training to equip children to develop their gifts and live out the callings God has for them.
Clean & Sanitary Water: Access to water wells and filtration systems, hygiene education and bathrooms to protect children and families from disease.
Health & Nutrition: Routine medical checkups and care, nutrition support and disease prevention to keep children healthy and growing.
How Are These Funds Distributed to Children?
When you and other faithful supporters give to a cause, the donations are pooled into a fund reserved for that specific purpose. Then, when a local church partner identifies a related need in their community, Compassion can quickly send funds to the church, so they’re equipped to meet that need.
Your donation goes directly to churches who best know the needs of the children they serve and can deliver specific care where it’s needed most. It’s all part of our commitment to financial integrity and stewarding your generous gifts wisely.
Have questions about giving? See our Donation FAQs.
Compassion Causes: A New Way to Meet Urgent Needs
Maybe you’re an athlete who’d love to help kickstart a soccer club for impoverished teens. Or maybe you’re a teacher who gets excited about ensuring children have learning tools like computer labs.
Whatever you’re passionate about, Compassion Causes has a project you can get excited about supporting. Compassion Causes is a new fundraising platform that allows you to connect directly to local churches working to meet urgent needs in their communities.
Once a project is fully funded, donations reach local churches in about a week, enabling near-immediate impact. And after you donate, you’ll see that impact for yourself through messages and pictures from the church as they work to complete their cause.
Life-Changing Gifts for Children, Families & Communities
What can you buy with $10? Perhaps lunch at a fast-food spot. Maybe your favorite latte and a scone. Or you could gift a child a Bible and introduce them to the love of Jesus.
This is just one example of the many one-time gifts you can give to children living in poverty through Compassion’s Gift Catalog. Each gift has the potential to not only change a child’s life but to bless their family and their community too.
Here are some examples:
A hygiene kit provides a child with soap, a toothbrush, toothpaste and even vitamins, equipping them to care for their bodies and restoring their dignity.
A cow can bring sustainable nutrition and income opportunities to a child and their family, equipping them to leave poverty behind.
A water well gives a child, their family and their community access to safe, clean water, protecting their health.
A mosquito net can protect a child from diseases like malaria and dengue fever, keeping them healthy, in school and thriving.
A small business startup bundle provides a family with business training and mentoring so they can earn steady income to meet their needs and plan for the future.
With one gift, you can equip a child, their family and even their community with the essentials they need to overcome their circumstances.
Compassion Nurturers for Essential Mom & Baby Care
Some of the most vulnerable to the effects of poverty are babies and the precious moms who carry and care for them. Many moms are forced to give birth without skilled help. And some even lack the prenatal care needed for a healthy pregnancy and the support after birth to help them raise their little ones.
Through Compassion Nurturers, you can nurture two lives at once by coming alongside vulnerable moms and babies from pregnancy through their first year together.
By becoming a Compassion Nurturer, you’ll help open new centers in Togo, Ethiopia and Burkina Faso — the three countries where moms and babies are most at risk. You’ll help provide pre- and postnatal care, safe water, nutritious food, home visits and other essentials, while receiving updates, pictures, letters and videos so you can watch these moms and babies grow healthy and strong!
Learn more about how Compassion cares for moms and babies.
Philanthropic Giving to Help Local Churches Reach Further
Right now, we can only reach 1.3% of the children in need within our current program countries. And we can only say yes to 20% of local churches who want to partner with us. So many children desperately need hope, and so many churches are ready to deliver it. They just need the resources.
That’s why Compassion offers philanthropic and strategic giving options for those who want to equip churches to reach further into their communities and beyond — so we can reach the next million children God is calling us to serve.
Compassion’s mission is to release children from poverty in Jesus’ name. We do so by equipping local churches to love and care for children with the hope of the gospel and in any way they need. But we can’t do it without you.
When you say yes to sponsorship, a cause, a gift or an initiative, you provide life-changing care where it’s needed most. Together, we can empower children, families and communities to break the cycle of poverty and step into the futures God has for them.
