Farewell, Four Waters

All she needed were stamps and signatures. Marie and her translator stood in the government offices in Kabul, Afghanistan to complete the paperwork for her new literacy project. The women in her home town-the northern village of Shehktan-would learn to read.

But a spattering of gun shots exploded and an aid worker crumpled. Executed. On the streets of Kabul. Just blocks from the guesthouse. Sending shockwaves through the community.

But the execution of the lone, aid worker was just the beginning.

When Marie returned home to Shehktan, she felt eyes watching her, piercing through her scarf as she walked the streets lined in mudbrick walls.

It took only 14 days for her project and her community to evaporate in an eruption of dust and grief. Betrayed, caught in a feud, and having loved people on both sides, Marie struggled for the answer: How could God be present here, working here, in the soul of Afghanistan?