Everyone knows the "cliche Pinterest-quote Mother Teresa" who is the universal go-to when we need to name someone good. But cliches aren't alive, aren't flesh and blood. Pretty infographic quotes don't reveal the groans of her deepest heart as she accepted decade after decade of spiritual darkness.
We should remember that Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu is not a saint for the quantity of her good works. She's a saint because she refused pride and despair. She refused to dismiss tiny acts of self-gift in favor of waiting for something more important. She refused to entertain the looming, heavy lie that unless we feel Him, God is gone.
She was born in 1910 in Macedonia. Hoping to be a missionary, she joined a teaching order based in Ireland and took the religious name “Teresa” after St Therese of Lisieux. The order assigned her to its convent school in Kolkata, India. For almost 20 years, she served as a teacher and eventually as headmistress. But on her walks outside the convent walls, she saw unimaginable poverty in the streets and slums. People suffered and starved, and some even died in the streets where they had fallen, alone and ignored. This neglect of human beings made in God’s image deeply disturbed her. She felt drawn to do something, but what?
She obtained permission to work in the slums on the weekends. Her work began by simply acknowledging human dignity in the residents: visiting their shacks, having conversations with them, bathing their children—whatever she could do to demonstrate that though society had neglected them, they too were made in God’s image and worthy of love. With her service, she showed them that their lives mattered just because they existed.
On retreat in 1946, Mother Teresa received an intense “call within a call” from God to serve the poor radically. After two years of discernment, she obtained permission to leave the order and devote herself to full-time work in the slums. She would not only serve the poor, but also become one of them, even in her clothing. She traded her habit for a sari made of the cheapest fabric available—white with a blue stripe. Others began joining her, and the group’s numbers and ministry expanded exponentially to operating orphanages, schools, services for pregnant women, and homes for the homeless, the disabled, addicts, AIDS patients, lepers, and the dying.
The heart of Mother Teresa’s vocation always remained the same: to restore the sacred dignity of each person she met, no matter how low the person’s condition or circumstance. Where some saw a waste of time and resources on the dying, Mother Teresa saw the image of God. Where some saw nothing but disease and filth, Mother Teresa saw Jesus.
It’s tempting to think that only a rare few could accomplish what Mother Teresa accomplished, but she's not a saint because it was somehow easier for her to be holy, or because she never battled depression, anger, desolation, insecurity, or doubt. She's a saint because she refused to let anything less than love command her imagination, her intellect, her will. All of us share the same capacity to love those around us, to treat them with fullness of human dignity, to cherish each human life for its own sake.
She died quietly on September 5, 1997, hidden in the swirling aftermath of Princess Diana's shocking death only days earlier before on August 31. Her feast is September 5.
Listen
Audrey Assad's song "Teresa" can help you understand Mother Teresa more fully than perhaps you ever have.
Books about Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the Saint of Calcutta: This collection of her personal letters to spiritual directors is compiled by her close friend Fr. Brian Kolodiejchuk, M.C., and reveals the depth of her spiritual desolation and sanctity.
Mother Teresa; A Personal Portrait: 50 Inspiring Stories Never Before Told: Mother Teresa's companion in ministry for many years, Fr. Leo Maasburg, shares powerful stories about small and great anecdotes of her life that reveal her trust and hope in God.
Do Something Beautiful for God: The Essential Teachings of Mother Teresa: 365 Daily Reflections: A collection of daily reflections distills her essential spiritual insights into a convenient, accessible format.
Mother Teresa: An Authorized Biography: Whereas the above resources offer spiritual application of and inspiration from Mother Teresa's insights, this book gives a classic biographical account of her incredible life.
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