November Holy Hero – St. Teresa of Calcutta: A Special Tribute to Mother Teresa In this Jubilee Year of Mercy, on September 4, 2016, Pope Francis canonized Mother Teresa of Calcutta. The way in which this humble, little sister lived out her life through the works of mercy is a reflection of God’s tender love for the poor. She was born Agnes Bojaxhiu on August 26, 1910 in Skopje, Serbia near the border of Europe and Asia. Agnes’s father died when she was nine years old. Her mother taught her that, as a Catholic, we must care for the poor and attend to their needs in whatever ways possible. In school, Agnes learned about India and the missionary work there. When she was twelve she felt called to religious life. At age eighteen Agnes joined the Loreto Sisters of Ireland that worked in Calcutta, India. She took the name Sr. Mary Teresa of the Child Jesus (after St. Therese of Lisieux, whose holiness was reached doing small things with great love). Sr. Teresa was sent to a girls’ school in Calcutta where she taught geography, history and English. She was very happy but Sr. Teresa began to notice the crushing poverty, misery and disease right outside the school walls in the slums of Calcutta. She wanted to help the poor people in whatever ways she could. On a train ride to Darjeeling in September, 1946, Sr. Teresa heard the clear call of Jesus to leave her convent to help serve the poorest of the poor. She obeyed this call and vowed to Jesus never to deny anything He asked of her. After she was given permission to leave the Loreto Sisters, Sr. Teresa went to the Holy Family Hospital to learn about medical care in order to aid the sick and the poor. She sat with the patients and held their hands, gave them sips of cool water, and gently held the crying children; little things done with great love. In 1950 Pope Pius XII approved Sr. Teresa’s new order called The Missionaries of Charity. They vowed to serve the poorest of the poor with tender compassion and mercy. She said, “We do all for Jesus.” She saw the face of Christ in the crying orphan, the forgotten, diseased people dying in the streets, and all those who were outcast, unwanted, and unloved. She knew in her heart that each human life was worthy of respect and dignity and held infinite value because ALL people are created in God’s own image. She encouraged her sisters to not only nurse the bodies of the sick and dying, but also their minds and souls. She said to first pray with the people, for it was not enough to give only medicine, they must also give them God! She told them to approach everyone they helped with joy and a smile! Sr. Teresa looked around at the countless people dying from disease and starvation in the streets and slums of Calcutta and asked the government of India for a place where she and her sisters could bring them and care for them in their final hours before going back to God. This House of the Dying (Nirmal Hriday, which means ‘Place of the Pure Heart’) opened on August 22, 1952.

Mother Teresa’s Missionary grew by leaps and bounds! This tiny, stooped nun was a great leader and organizer who led her sisters with determination, faith, joy, and hope and peace. Prayer and the Holy Eucharist were her strength and fueled her efforts. Just as Christ did, Mother and the sisters chose to live as one of the poor. If the sisters could identify with the people they were serving, they could touch the hearts of the poor even deeper. They owned practically nothing, trusting in God to provide what was needed. In September, 1955, Mother founded the first home for sick, unwanted and crippled children. She never, ever refused any child. Babies and children were being thrown away in trash dumpsters and street gutters, diseased and starving to death. Mother and her sisters saw Jesus in those little faces and rescued them; giving them the love and tender care they never had before. There were thousands suffering from leprosy (a terrible skin disease) in Calcutta at the time. They were shunned from society and no one wanted them. Mother and the sisters drove vans around to the lepers and gave them medicine, advice and loving care. She called this, ‘Touch a Leper with Kindness’. They showed them how to wash and take care of their sores. They helped them build houses and taught them life skills so they would be able to take care of themselves. Many were even cured because of this effort. As Mother Teresa’s charitable work became known, donations were sent to the Missionaries from far and wide. She was able to establish Missionaries of Charity branches throughout India. They opened clinics, shelters, schools, training centers and homes for the dying, and children and orphans. Her deep love for Christ in the poorest of the poor was blooming into a worldwide mission of love and mercy, touching thousands of souls. Mother called herself ‘God’s little pencil’. She said, “I am nothing. He is all. I do nothing on my own. He does it.” She placed herself completely in God’s hands and denied Him nothing that He asked of her as she had promised. By that obedience millions of people have been inspired by the tender, compassionate love she had for the poor, sick, unwanted, unloved and forgotten people of God. Year after year Mother Teresa received countless honors and awards from all over the world. In her humble spirit she was reluctant to receive this attention, but she accepted the honors in the name of Christ’s poor. As she entered her eighties, Mother became more frail and faced many health problems. Surrounded by her sisters, Mother Teresa died of heart failure on September 5, 1997. Her spirit lives on in the Missionaries of Charity orders all over the globe with thousands of Sisters, Brothers, Priests and laypeople serving her beloved poor. Mother Teresa LIVED the Gospel message that we find in Matthew 25: “Whatever you do to the least of my people, you do it to me.” Her entire ministry, spanning fifty years, was based on this! In a sea of misery, Mother Teresa carried the bright light of the love of Jesus Christ to the suffering masses and showed them just how precious they are in the eyes of God.

“What I can do, you cannot. What you can do, I cannot. But together, we can do something beautiful for God.” -Mother Teresa