Blessed Teresa of Calcutta

BLESSED TERESA OF CALCUTTA

SHE IS A FIRST-CLASS MIRACLE FROM GOD. 

A God's gift to humanity.  She was born to be a saint.  It was her fate and destiny. 

At age 18, she did not want to become a nun at first and leave her family in Skopje, Yugoslavia (now Republic of Macedonia).  But she heard the call of God loud and strong and her interest in the mission in India became more than an interest.  It was her karma.  She wanted to be a missionary - to go out and give the life of Christ to the people.  A Yugoslav priest in Bengal, India, wrote that the Sisters of the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary, commonly known as Sisters of Loreto, were quite active in the area.   She applied for entry and her mother Drana accepted what was to be about little Conxha (rosebud) and be separated from her, maybe forever.  She boarded the train at Skopje Railroad Station going to Zagreb and met Betike who also wished to be a Sister of Loreto.  The train chug-along passed Austria onto Paris where they have to be interviewed at the Loreto House.  Thereafter, they were permitted to go to Loreto Abbey in Dublin, Ireland, where they spent six weeks of novitiate training and studied English most of the time.  They left for their long voyage to India about mid-November 1928, taking them to Suez Canal, the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean and arriving at the Bay of Bengal seven weeks later, around first week of January 1929.    

Mother Teresa's early years in Calcutta can only be told in a book for they were a lifetime of teaching, helping and caring with love and smile to the poorest of the poor; picking up men, women and children in the gutters and streets because in each of them she saw the face of Jesus.  Calcutta in imperial India was a "steaming pit of misery" in those days.  Until 1912, Calcutta was an imperial city - the capital of British India.  She said, "Our work calls for us to see Jesus in everyone."  That the good that is possible is obligatory.

"If I had not picked up that first person dying in the street, I would not have picked up the thousands later on."

Mother Teresa, with permission from the Vatican, founded the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta on October 7, 1950.  She told the Vatican from the very first time that she did not want to be involved with financial accountability.  There lies the absolute ignorance of her critics, who did not know any better, who failed in shaming the hard works of Mother Teresa in future times.  An old abandoned Hindu temple of Goddess Kali located at 54A Lower Circular Road became the motherhouse of the House for the Dying (Nirmal Hriday Ashram).  Kali was the wife of Siva, the Destroyer.  In the Hindu pantheon of gods and goddesses, the trinity is composed of Brahma the Creator, Siva the Destroyer and Vishnu the Preserver.  Only the providence of God would give a Catholic nun who hailed from a Communist country a Hindu temple a place of faith and hope. 

The Mission:

• Nursing the sick and dying destitutes of leprosy, tuberculosis, cholera and malaria.  As a microbiologist, who wears mask and gloves to touch and test known bodily specimens,  it's beyond words how Mother Teresa and the Sisters don't seem to notice the stench, the sores of cadaverous patients with bare hands and the miasma of death.  Their complete dependence on the providence of God must have been their saving grace. 
• Gathering and teaching little street children at the Children's Home (Shishu Bavan)
• Giving shelter to the homeless
• Caring for the unwanted, the unloved, and the lonely
• Proclaiming the word of God by our presence and spiritual works of mercy - the Sisters of Missionaries of Charity are called "Running Sisters" because they walk so fast.  They are also known as "Preachers of Love."  There is a Hindu saying: When you pray, you must move your feet.  The Sisters when they walk the streets of Calcutta to visit and care the women and children usually pray the Rosary not only once but five times.
• Adoration of Jesus in and by the Blessed Sacrament

I usually get in my mailbox about 20 to 30 letters a week from charitable organizations in the United States and as far as Africa but none from Missionaries of Charity.  Now I found out why.  She said in a speech at the convention of the National Council of Catholic Women in Las Vegas, October 1960,  that people only needed to know the needs of their fellow human beings. 

"I don't beg.  I have not beg from the time I started the work.  But I go to the people - the Hindus, the Mohammedans, and the Christians - and I tell them: I have come to give you a chance to do something beautiful for God.  And the people, they want something beautiful for God and they come forward."

There are Missionaries of Charity worldwide (Incomplete List):

1965 - Cocorote, Venezuela

1968 - Rome, Italy

           Tabora, Tanzania

1969 - Melbourne, Australia

1970 - Amman, Jordan

            Southhall, London, England

1971 - Bronx, New York, USA

1972 - Dacca, Bangladesh

            Mauritius

            Belfast, Northern Ireland

1973 - Gaza, Israel

            Hodeida, Yemen

             Lima, Peru

             Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

1974 - Hanuabada, Papua New Guinea

            Palermo, Sicily

1975 - Naples, Italy

1976 - Mexico City, Mexico

            Guatemala City, Guatemala

1977 - Manila, Philippines

            Haiti, West Indies

            Rotterdam, the Netherlands

1978 - Metro-Manila, Philippines

            Zarate, Argentina

            El Dorado, Panama

1979 - Beirut, Lebanon

            Essen, West Germany

           Zagreb, Yugoslavia

           Nairobi, Kenya

           Salvado Bahia, Brazil

           Kigali, Rwanda

1980 - Ghent, Belgium

           Katmandu, Nepal

           Marseilles, France

           Skopje, Yugoslavia

           Madrid, Spain

           Santiago, Chile

1981 - Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic

           La Paz, Bolivia

           Cucuta, Colombia

           East Berlin, Germany

           Cairo, Egypt

           Belabo, Cameroon

           Tokyo, Japan

           Seoul, South Korea

           Macao

 1982 - Gangtok, Sikkim

            Setubal, Portugal

            Dublin, Ireland

            Giteranji, Burundi

1983 - Kowloon, Hongkong

            West Berlin, West Germany

            Livingston, Scotland

            Davao City, Philippines

            Calbayog, Philippines

            Tegucigalpa, Honduras

            Port Victoria, Seychelles

1984 - Mokochung, Assam

           Warsaw, Poland

           Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

           Colombo, Sri Lanka

1985 to 1986 - Damascus, Syria

                        Lahore, Pakistan

                        Singapore

The number of houses, including those in India and the inner cities of the United States, Latin America, Australia and Africa rose to 330 .  By 2012, the 13 Sisters of Missionaries of Charity multiplied to 4, 500 in 133 countries. 

"God doesn't require us to succeed, he only requires that you try."

She must be thinking of her 3-day trip to Communist China on January 20, 1985.  The party leader was Deng Xiaoping, who was demoted for a while but welcome back to the fold with open arms.  He was very much credited for making China into a somewhat capitalistic society that is today.  Mother Teresa attended a Latin Mass celebrated by an old priest (Chinese?) at the Cathedral of Immaculate Conception in Peking (Beijing) with many people attending.  I know the spot for our tour bus passed it by in 2005.  The government let her get in touch with Deng Pufang, son of Deng Xiaoping, who was handicapped, being thrown out of a window by the Red Guards during Mao's Cultural Revolution.  After much niceties, and touring the collective welfare for the blind and handicaps, Mother Teresa asked if the Missionaries of Charity could provide love and care also.  No invitation came.  She was hoping for the best even when a blind man she met at the workshop factory she visited told her, "We owe everything to the Communist Party."
Mother Teresa, the faithful servant, became the citizen of Heaven on September 5, 1997.  The Mother of Bengal, if not the world, was at peace.