The Fatherhood Project

The case for fathers sponsoring fathers

I’ve had a thesis bouncing around in my head for the past few years that I’ve wanted to test in real life.

If we want to help the poor, instead of sponsoring children, we should sponsor fathers.

This occurred to me when I heard someone say they traveled to a ministry in a poor country where they had been sponsoring children for years and were surprised to see parents dropping their children off at the ministry compound. These parents believed their child would have a better childhood in a group home being sponsored by wealthy Christians than in their own family’s home. Sponsoring children helps orphans but apparently, it can also create them.

This is actually unsurprising.

It’s very difficult to do good instead of harm when giving charitably, especially at large scale.

Books like “When Helping Hurts” and “Toxic Charity” describe how good intentions can easily go wrong. When you ship grain to a starving country you can put local farmers out of business and make the next famine far worse. When you give a flood of free shoes every cobbler in the country goes out of business. Giving goods can wipe out whole industries. We too often solve short-term problems by creating long-term dependence.

I was also struck by one study that tested a bunch of ways of doing good and found that directly giving poor people money had the largest positive impact. 

So here’s the simple thesis I’m considering testing: give money directly to a group of poor Christian fathers over a three-year period.

Some steps to make this happen.

• Find a person of peace with a network of poor Christian families in a concentrated area.

• Have them choose 10 fathers to enroll in the program.

• Every month I, with the person of peace and the 10 fathers, have a one-hour Zoom call after which they each receive $100.

• On the call we discuss:

  • How their family is going

  • How their faith is going

  • What they are doing with the $100 so they can compare notes

  • Principles they are discovering to bless their family spiritually and financially

  • What steps are helping become more financially independent

• At the end of three years, they graduate in order to not create a long-term dependence.

And if you’re wondering if $100 per month would make a real difference check out this list that ranks the average monthly salary per country.

The principles that I’m hoping to protect in order to ensure this program would do more good than harm are:

• Accountability: I would ensure the full amount got directly into the hands of those fathers and that they understood the purpose of the money. 

• Honor: They could choose to do what they think is best to do with the money. They are the father and we’d honor their leadership. 

• Wisdom: They would get to hear ideas from fathers in similar circumstances to help them find ways to maximize the use of the money.

• Financial Independence: Knowing the day the flow of money would end will help them plan long-term. They know they'll receive a total of $3600 over the three years and should think of what they can do with that total amount to put their family on a better footing.

• Family: Strong families are what lift people out of generational poverty.

This is ALL just theory at this point. What I’m planning to do next is talk to people who can improve on this thesis before attempting to implement it anywhere.

Are there fatal flaws in this approach?

Has someone already found a better way to help families?

Stay tuned for podcasts with those I’m seeking out to give me insight.