Converting to Christianity, which you could be killed for under Taliban rule, is no longer a criminal offense, but remains a very risky choice in this conservative Muslim country. Just two years ago, the new Constitution notwithstanding, an Afghan man was sentenced to death for converting – and was only reprieved, on grounds of insanity, after a massive international campaign. He later went into exile.

Christian groups estimate the number of Afghan Christians here ranges between 500 and 8,000 – in a country of over 30 million Muslims. Official churches don't exist, and congregants often gather in secret, using coded messages to direct them to the underground churches that move weekly.

Christian expatriates can gather freely to pray or study in Afghanistan – but are not immune from the deep-seated animosity toward the religion either. The small number of Christian aid organizations with offices in the country keep a low profile and clearly state they are focused on humanitarian, and not religious work.

But last year, a group of 23 South Korean church volunteers were kidnapped in southern Afghanistan and two were killed before the others were released.

More recently, in October, Gayle Williams, a young woman working for Serve Afghanistan, a Britain-based Christian charity, was killed as she walked to work through a busy intersection in Kabul. The Taliban claimed responsibility, saying she was killed because she was proselytizing – a claim Serve Afghanistan has refuted, insisting the aid worker was running a project for disabled children.

Fear of being accused of proselytizing worries Capt. Scott Jensen, who leads the KAIA services, but he refuses to close the doors of his little wooden church to anyone.

"There are people turning to me saying the Islamic faith is not filling the hole within them. They want to explore Christianity," he says. "We don't do missionizing work, but we are defined by our love and we reach out in love."

Captain Jensen, an ordained Lutheran pastor from San Antonio who has logged 23 years in the military, is not in Afghanistan as an official chaplain, but rather as a communications director, in charge of keeping the KAIA network working, and training Afghan counterparts. His last service he conducted was supposed to be on Thursday, but with no one else to hold regular non-Catholic services for the 2,200 troops on base he volunteered to help. Jensen spends some 15 hours a week, he says, preparing services, writing a bulletin, and counseling those in need.

One day, he recounts, he got a phone call from someone who said he had some questions. "A man called and told me he had been reading the Bible in secret. He said, 'I want to talk to you about it.' "

In time, a handful of other Afghans began contact with Jensen as well, all reaching out to him through trusted personal connections. All are welcome at services and care is taken to secretly ease their way onto the base, protect their identities, and make them feel at home.

"I don't get into the politics of it," says Sr. Master Sgt. Cedric Pinnock, an aircraft mechanic and regular at services. "I'm just glad we could provide them with community."

Back at the prayer circle, the hymn has ended and Jensen starts his benediction.

"Let us pray for those killed in the bombing today and give their families strength," he says, in reference to a suicide attack that left six dead downtown earlier that afternoon. "And let's pray for those who perpetuated this crime."

"Let us pray for the Christians in the underground church and for a day to come in which there is freedom of religion in Afghanistan – and each and every person can practice what they believe," he ends.

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