TERESA WORD

IN ACTION

BY ANTONIO GASPARI

Her Missionaries are called "the army

of charity," but their strength comes from prayer.

Mother Teresa is, above all, a great mystic

Mother Teresa is 86 years old, tiny and wiry, with a wrinkle-furrowed face, twinkling eyes and a candid smile. Her hands are knotty with age, her feet swollen from hard work. She has an ailing heart and diseased lungs. She wears a cotton sari and rough leather sandals. Her labor is quiet and discreet. But her life, spent in indefatigable devotion to the poorest of the poor, the sick and dying, has managed to profoundly touch our skeptical modern world. Not only Christians -- Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, atheists, agnostics, Communists, even the most cynical, express admiration for Mother Teresa's person and work. Of her, Indira Gandhi once said: "In comparison, we all feel small and ashamed." She is the only religious Fidel Castro has agreed to assist. In 1979 she won the Nobel Prize for Peace.

Mother Teresa has been characterized as a saint; yet she considers herself merely God's humble instrument. Her work is described as miraculous; but praise leaves her indifferent. "If you have faith, you can move mountains," Christ said in the Gospels. Mother Teresa is living proof of this testimony. Beginning among Calcutta's sick and dying street population, she has extended her mission to Third World bidonvilles and Western slums. Nothing stops her. She proceeds with the force of a tank and the grace of an angel. She sees the worst our planet has to offer, yet never loses hope.

Still, Mother Teresa has in recent months been fiercely criticized. Why? Because, say her critics, she is "authoritarian," because she has "fundamentalist" moral and religious views, because she and the order she founded lack "professionalism" in their care of the sick and dying. Are these criticisms merely envy and scandal-mongering, the inevitable response to a life spent in the limelight? Or are obscure interests working to besmirch Mother Teresa's work and reputation?

Our report takes an in-depth look at the true Mother Teresa. How can she be so saintly? How did she arrive at that point? Where does she find the resources to carry out such a vast network of charitable services?

HER STORY

Agnes Bojaxhiu (Mother Teresa's real name) was born on August 27, 1910 into a well-off and very pious family in Skopje, Albania. Her father was a well-known businessman and building contractor and also a true Christian who opened his home to the poor. Her mother was respected as a women motivated by her strong Catholic faith. The Bojaxhius were a close, happy and accomplished family. (Agnes had a sister, Aga, and brother, Lazarus.) As a girl, Agnes wrote poetry, sang beautifully, and played several musical instruments. In her parish, she joined the Marian confraternity organized by the Jesuits. She was particularly fascinated by the stories of Jesuit service in India. Agnes sensed her vocation in high school, and at the age of 18 years decided to become a missionary in India. Entering the Congregation of the Sisters of Loreto, she left Skopje for training in Ireland in 1928, arriving in India in 1929. Upon taking her final vows on May 31, 1931, she chose the name Teresa, inspired by the model of St. Teresa of Lisieux.

Agnes was not to see her family together again. Her father had died in 1919; her mother passed away in 1972, and Aga in 1973. By that time Skopje was under Communist rule. The Marxist dictator Enver Hoxha had declared Albania the world's first and only official atheist state; the Tirana cathedral was turned into a movie theater. Only years later, in 1991, was Mother Teresa able to open three centers of her Order of Charity in her native country.

In India, Mother Teresa began a brilliant career, soon becoming principal of a Bengali high school and mother superior of a diocesan order of Indian nuns, the Daughters of St. Anne, teachers in Calcutta's secondary schools. Mother Teresa taught history and geography in one of the city's most attractive neighborhoods.

During the night of September 10, 1946, Mother Teresa experienced her "second vocation." According to her own words: "I opened my eyes to suffering and understood the true essence of my calling." Teresa felt she must leave the convent and live among the poor. God had asked her to leave her tranquil and secure life with the Sisters of Loreto.

At the outset, Teresa's fellow nuns regarded her as someone with "strange ideas," and even the Archbishop of Calcutta, Msgr. Ferdinando Perier, expressed doubts concerning her choice.

On August 16, 1948, Mother Teresa gave back her Sisters of Loreto habit and set out to live in the streets of Calcutta. "That was the biggest sacrifice of my life," she later affirmed.

Realizing that the most of Calcutta's poor were also seriously diseased, Mother Teresa took a nursing course with the Dengel Missionary Sisters, finishing in four months rather than the customary twelve. She moved to Calcutta's most miserable ghetto, the Motijhil, where she slept on the floor of a straw hut rented for five rupees (50 cents) a month. On her second day she began to teach five Bengali children the alphabet, using the soil as a blackboard.

The climate was unbearable, a temperature of 46 degrees and humidity at 95%; the slum was buried in trash and garbage, criss-crossed by filthy sewers, and infested by insects, rats and cockroaches. The memory of her former neat little schoolroom, with fan and mosquito netting, must have tortured Mother Teresa as a vision of lost paradise. Fortunately, there always seemed to be someone who brought food or money, which she immediately distributed among the poor. The tiny Albanian nun passed from hut to hut, comforting the blind, crippled and leprous, encountering horrible deformities and diseases.

When asked how she kept up her spirits, Mother Teresa replied: "I abandoned myself totally to God, and He guided me. I felt His presence every moment and sensed His direct intervention."

When food and money gave out, Mother Teresa prayed: "Lord, I now have nothing. You must provide."

From these first experiences, Mother Teresa formed her Rule: "Our specific mission is to work for the salvation and the sanctification of the poorest of the poor... living among them, as they live." Based on this Rule, she founded a new religious order, the Missionaries of Charity, to assist her in her mission. The Rule and Congregation were approved by Pope Pius XII in 1950.

Mother Teresa's radical mission and lifestyle are based on the figure of Christ. One day an American journalist commented, observing Mother Teresa as she tended a gangrenous patient: "I wouldn't do that for a million dollars!" "Neither would I," replied Mother Teresa, "but I do it for Christ." In fact, such tasks can only be performed for love. For Mother Teresa, "suffering and pain -- these crosses are the precious gifts God sends to me." The minute Albanian nun sees Jesus in every sick or dying human being: "They are Jesus. Each one is Jesus in a distressing disguise."

Her Work

Mother Teresa created a type of home for these "hidden Christs": it was named House for the Dying. The idea was born out of necessity and rejection in the following way.

One day Mother Teresa came across a man dying in the street. She brought him to the hospital, where he was turned away as too hopeless to receive treatment. That experience inspired Mother Teresa to establish a home where the dying could receive assistance in their last hours, with the comfort of a human presence, a tender smile, and assurances of their divine Father's welcome. Using an abandoned pilgrims' refuge formerly attached to the Kali Temple, in 1954 Mother Teresa established the first refuge for the dying, "Nirmal Hriday," or "Pure Heart" in Bengali.

Mother Teresa's refuge for the dying encountered strong opposition. The 400 priests from the Kalighat Temple protested that Mother Teresa and her nuns were only trying to proselytize, to spread Christianity. An eminent Indian political leader promised the irate population he would close down the center. The politician made a well-publicized visit, observing how the nuns cared for the sick and dying, how they treated wounds, washed diseased bodies, fed those who could no longer eat themselves. When he exited to face the crowds and press, the politician stated: "I promised to banish the nuns and I will do so, but before that happens, your mothers, wives and sisters must come here and do what these Sisters are doing. In the temple we have a goddess of stone; but here we have a goddess who is alive." Afterwards, one of the Kali priests was stricken by tuberculosis, a dreaded and extremely infectious disease in India. Only Mother Teresa's sisters agreed to care for him. He recovered and became a great supporter of Mother Teresa and her activities.

During his trip to India in February 1986, Pope John Paul II visited Mother Teresa's refuge for the dying. "He stayed a long while, insisting on feeding several of the helpless and assisting at the death of three persons," Mother Teresa later said. "In the course of his visit he only managed to say one word. He was very moved, and warm tears covered his cheeks." In the year 1992, approximately 50,000 were received in Mother Teresa's refuge for the dying. About half of these died; the other half recovered from what had appeared to be certain death.

Mother Teresa's original home for the dying has become a place of prayer. The low, whitewashed building is open to all. In one corner there is a statue of the Madonna with a diadem of gold rings on her head. These gold nose-rings were worn by women who expired in the center. "Thus," explained Mother Teresa, "those who had nothing on earth were able to give a crown of gold to the Mother of God."

HOUSES FOR ABANDONED CHILDREN AND ORPHANS:

This story is told about Mother Teresa. An NBC TV crew, in Calcutta some years ago to film a documentary on the Missionary Sisters of Charity, decided to accompany Mother Teresa on her daily rounds. At one point, the journalist and cameraman reported later, Mother Teresa threw herself upon an immense garbage dump, digging stubbornly among the rotting vegetables and food scraps. They were astonished, then incredulous as they witnessed her pull out the tiny body of a newborn baby, with its umbilical cord still attached. Mother Teresa explained that due to her searches of trash and garbage dumps, hundreds of abandoned babies had already been rescued. Some of these were deformed or handicapped, but most were simply unwanted girls. (In India female infanticide is a grave problem.)

Mother Teresa founded the first home for abandoned babies in Calcutta in 1955, naming it "Shishu Bhavan," or "Children's Home" in the Bengali language. The house filled with infants, brought in great numbers from all over India. "I am mother to thousands of abandoned children, recuperated from streets and sidewalks, from trash cans and garbage dumps, brought to me by the police, by hospitals where mothers have refused to accept them," she once said. "I have saved them, tended them and taught them. Many have found adoptive families throughout the world, in India, America, Europe. And they always remember me. They send me their photos. And when I look at these photos, I am filled with joy. I feel I have loved these children as a true mother, as Jesus Christ has taught me. Some are still with me -- the handicapped, the mentally retarded, the deformed. Nature has treated them cruelly. But they are sons of God and they also need love. In fact, they are my favorites. At times the hospital personnel comment that these infants would be better off dead. But we take them anyway. Refusing to love them would be like killing them ourselves."

LEPROSY CENTERS

It is estimated that there are four million lepers in the world. Of these, three million live in India, and in Calcutta alone there are half a million. This disease which gradually consumes fingers, hands, feet, arms, legs, and face, makes humans disgusting to behold. Caring for lepers is a heroic act, an infrequent choice, even for the most saintly. St. Francis of Assisi marked his own "conversion" with his embrace of a leper.

In Mother Teresa's spiritual vision, lepers are very precious human beings. She began her work with lepers in 1957. "I realize, that when I touch the odorous and oozing members of a leper, I am touching the body as Christ, just as I take His body in the Sacrament of the Eucharist," she once said. Mahatma Gandhi also described lepers as "God's best-loved sons."

In 1959, Mother Teresa opened an important lepers' center, which she named "Ghandiji's Prem Nivas," meaning "Ghandi's Gift of Love," in honor of the Indian leader's promotion of leper care. Mother Teresa's most important lepers' center is the "Shanti Nagar," or "Place of Peace," a self-sufficient village 200 miles from Calcutta where lepers live as free citizens, without fear of being banished, humiliated or marginalized. The lepers live in small, neat houses and work in shops, fields or pastures. There is a hospital for the most seriously ill. Infants born into leper families receive schooling and medical care to arrest the progress of the disease if it becomes apparent. In the village, many healthy volunteers work along with the lepers. One volunteer commented: "Lepers may appear deformed and hideous, but they can be intelligent human beings and capable of much love."

In her travels around the world, Mother Teresa carries a rough cotton basket containing her most essential items. She takes great care of this simple "purse," as if it were an object of great value, a special gift, or family souvenir. In fact, it was made for her by her "favorite children," the Indian lepers. She realizes the great difficulty with which they must have fashioned this with their maimed hands, and she guards it as a precious treasure.

HOME FOR AIDS PATIENTS

AIDS has often been described as the twentieth century leprosy. "Those afflicted with AIDS are forsaken by all, but they are also God's children and in need of love and care," Mother Teresa has said. "We have already opened two AIDS homes in New York City, and several others are in preparation. We are now searching for places where we can care for children born of AIDS-afflicted parents. Poor innocent creatures. Their lives will be a torture because of the disease they inherit. We must do all we can to alleviate their suffering, to convince them that God loves them, and that because of their suffering they are especially favored by their divine Father."

CARE FOR THE SOLITARY

One day, making a comparison between Western countries and India, Mother Teresa said: "Leprosy is indeed an almost unbearable suffering; but equally unbearable is the sense of being unloved, abandoned or unwanted. The extreme solitude I have observed in certain persons in the developed West is even more unbearable than leprosy. Once in New York City, a very wealthy man came to one of our centers and told me: `Please come to visit me. I am almost blind and my wife seems to be going mad. My wife and I are dying of loneliness. We have a great desire to hear around us the sound of human voices.' That man lived in a magnificent home and had enormous wealth, but he was more miserable than a poor Indian leper."

THE MISSIONARIES OF CHARITY

In 1949 Mother Teresa accepted her first candidate for her new religious congregation, a former student from the Calcutta high school where she had been instructor and principal. Mother Teresa founded her religious order, the Missionaries of Charity, in 1950. Today her 4,600 Missionaries of Charity administer 400 centers of different types in 126 countries .

In 1976, Mother Teresa founded the contemplative branch of her order, and in 1977 a masculine branch of the Missionaries of Charity, called the "Missionary Brothers of Charity." In spite of the extremely rigorous religious life required by the Order's Rule, the Missionaries of Charity is the only religious order in the world which has more candidates than it can accept. Young women and men of every race and nationality, spurred by Mother Teresa's example, leave their comfortable world to follow the path she has indicated. In the history of the Church, only St. Francis of Assisi had such a vast and profound impact.

Mother Teresa has refused gifts of washing machines and other modern technology. Her nuns must work by hand, as the poor people around them. The Sisters of Charity must feed, clothe, and care for thousands of suffering human beings and sometimes they are called upon to provide expensive treatments or sophisticated operations. They pay for such treatments, and for the upkeep of their hundreds of centers, with the donations they receive. The tens of thousands of poor and suffering they care for consume and cost quite a bit.

Besides the usual three vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, the Sisters of Charity make a fourth vow of charity: service to the poorest of the poor. "The reason for our poverty," explains Mother Teresa, "is love. Those we help are poor against their will. Our poverty is the fruit of free choice."

The total costs for the entire religious Order amount to a staggering figure. Yet Mother Teresa has not saved a penny; she functions as she did at the beginning of her mission in the Calcutta ghetto, without even a bank account. Her congregation was founded in poverty and continues thus -- absolute poverty. The Rule is severe on that point: the sisters must remain poor -- as individuals and as a community.

But then who is responsible for the congregation's administration? Mother Teresa clarifies: "My mission is administered by Divine Providence. Our Constitution states: `We and our poor have complete faith in Divine Providence. We are not ashamed to beg from door to door, following Christ's example and living from the charity of others as we serve our sick and poor.' That is, Providence provides our resources through generous individuals who wish to work with us. Thus we live from contributions, charity, alms and small gestures of love and generosity, from thousands of different persons. To prove our faith in Providence, we refuse any type of permanent funding -- loans, salaries, or subsidies. We also discourage persons or organizations from contributing on a regular basis -- monthly, or weekly, or annually, for example. Of course a regular income would help us make long-term plans and projects, but with such assistance we could no longer call ourselves daughters of Providence."

To serve this difficult evangelical ideal, Mother Teresa has accustomed her nuns to never think of "tomorrow." The Rule says: "We must leave to omnipotent God each and every plan for the future. For yesterday has passed, and tomorrow has not yet come; we have only today to know, love and serve Jesus Christ."

To keep her congregation's immense structure intact, Mother Teresa has need of daily miracles. "Just so," Mother Teresa affirms. "Each day God accomplishes true miracles. We have concrete proof of this. If we could not count on these daily prodigies (wonders, marvels), we could not proceed, or even survive. No sister responsible for administering one of our centers could sleep tranquilly without immense faith in God. We almost never have enough to live for more than a week at a time; sometimes we lack the funds to survive an entire day. And yet, somehow, help seems to arrive at the last moment. The Lord inspires the most unexpected persons to come to our assistance, and for the most varied reasons. If this help were lacking, how could we continue?"

Mother Teresa recalled this incident: "In Calcutta, we cook very day for 9,000 persons. One day a nun came to me to report that we had nothing left for the weekend. I started to pray to Jesus, explaining our needs in great detail, and Friday morning a truck arrived with milk and butter. These provisions had been destined for one of the city's school-lunch programs, but the schools called a strike and closed, and the food was given to us instead." In fact, Mother Teresa can recount hundreds of similar stories.

YET SOME OPPOSE HER

Mother Teresa is appreciated and admired throughout the entire world. She has received the world's highest humanitarian honor -- the Nobel Peace Prize (in 1979). On the other hand, Mother Teresa's inexhaustible charity has also aroused irritation and criticism. These are the main accusations against her:

(1) Hindu nationalists have criticized her for "interfering" in internal Indian affairs and for "proselytizing" among Hindus who are sick and dying, winning them over, in the midst of their suffering, to Christianity;

(2) Some Western critics have alleged she is a hypocrite, that she talks a great deal about the poor but actually frequents the rich and well-to-do in various parts of the world, meeting with them to talk about her work and plans; these writers have also criticized her for meeting with various dictators, as she establishes centers in places like Cuba, where she met with Fidel Castro; and they have suggested that she herself is "authoritarian" in her way of leading her order;

(3) Other Western journalists and social activists accuse her of "misplaced priorities"; they say she offers only "band-aid solutions" to "systemic" problems, caring for the poor and dying but not helping to change their lot in the world;

(4) Still others see in her intense concentration on the world's "hopeless cases" an unhealthy psychological "fixation," suggesting that she is mentally unbalanced;

(5) Many have criticized her for her orthodoxy, alleging, for example, that her uncompromising stands against abortion and homosexuality are "fundamentalist" positions, that her Catholicism is "reactionary," not "progressive";

(6) Finally, there have been charges that her sisters are not well-trained and that the medical care they give their patients is not of the quality they would receive in secular hospitals; in short, that the Missionaries of Charity are "unprofessional."

From time to time, complaints of Mother Teresa's alleged "authoritarianism" and "iron hand" have filtered from her houses and centers. And even in Catholic circles, there have been complaints regarding the professional preparation of Mother Teresa's Sisters of Charity, as well as concern that the nuns' assistance to the poor and sick stresses spiritual to the detriment of practical care.

The latest censure appeared in the October 14 edition of the British daily The Guardian, which reported that: "While the sick and dying lie about unattended, the Sisters of Charity spend long hours in silent prayer." In the article, Stephen King, of the Catholic charity group Cafod, was quoted to the effect that: "Mother Teresa takes care of the poorest of the poor, but never deals with why they are poor." Leo Bashyam of Christian Aid is quoted as saying: "We are fighting for justice, we are campaigning for education and human rights. Mother Teresa limits herself to keeping people alive. She deals only with the disease and not with preventing it. But people in the West continue to give her money."

The Guardian also charges that Mother Teresa's management style -- or lack of it, since she has avoided developing her "corporate structure" and "funding" -- will render her work ephemeral and insecure. Her complete dependence on faith and providence, rather than on others, inside and outside of the Church, means that, after her death, the Missionaries of Charity will "slide into obscurity," the paper predicts.

Some of these attacks, like those criticizing Mother Teresa for her moral stands, are less attacks on her than on Christian belief and practice in general. However, it should not be forgotten that Mother Teresa has upset some powerful interest groups. The self-sufficient and free-of-cost charity services offered by Mother Teresa and her nuns compete with public and private commercial interests in the relief assistance "establishment." It would be of some interest to these groups to "marginalize" their "competitor" (Mother Teresa and the Missionaries of Charity) by discrediting Mother Teresa's character and work. It would not be surprising, then, to see more of this criticsm in the future.

LIFE AMONG THE MISSIONARIES OF CHARITY

If a young woman wishes to enter Mother Teresa's congregation, she must first observe the missionaries' life and work for a sufficient time to assure herself of her vocation. Once her mind is made up, she has a two-year novitiate, or training period. During that period she works along with other nuns who have already taken their permanent vows. She may be assigned to care for the poor, to comfort the dying, or to ask for alms. As she learns, the new sister also tests her own capacity for and devotion to the type of work she will carry out for the rest of her life. Once her novitiate is successfully completed, she takes her final vows according to the Rule of the congregation.

The Sisters of Charity wear a white sari of rough cotton, bordered by three sky-blue colored stripes, and held at the top by a clasp in the form of a crucifix (a constant reminder of Christ's Passion). Under the sari they have a high-necked, long-sleeved, ankle-length white cotton shift. The nuns' personal belongings are reduced to a minimum and must be contained in a small bag. They each have three shifts and two saris. When required to move house, they can be ready in ten minutes. The Rule specifies that their residences must be spare and simple, and resemble as much as possible those of the poor they serve. In Third World countries, they may live in miserable shacks or dirt hovels. They renounce any claims to privacy.

A day in the life of a Sister of Charity is dominated by prayer. The Missionaries of Charity, in fact, are contemplative nuns who live in the world, and prayer is the foundation of their life and work. They will be found praying in the street, during their work, or when traveling from one place to another. "If we were not in constant union with God," explains Mother Teresa, "how could we endure the sacrifices we must make by living in the most miserable conditions?"

The Missionaries of Charity arise at 4:30 A.M. and spend their first 1 1/2 hours in communal prayer; then breakfast, and a full day of work. They may run a shelter for homeless women or assist the elderly and lonely by cleaning their houses, washing their clothes, feeding them, and keeping them company. They may even go begging for those who have nothing. Usually curfew is at 22:00 for all of Mother Teresa's centers.

Mother Teresa assures us that she keeps the same hours as the rest of her Missionaries. "I am a nun as they are. It is difficult even for the youngest among us to get up at 4:30 A.M. But I am young at heart, and this sacrifice is one more way for us to prove our love of God."

THE FUTURE

Surprisingly, the energetic Mother Teresa has never been particularly healthy or robust; she has suffered from a weak heart and weak lungs since she was a child. She is so slight and emaciated, it is hard to understand how she finds the strength to carry out such prodigious tasks. In 1983 Mother Teresa had her first heart attack (age 73); in 1989 she received a "pacemaker"; in 1991 she suffered another heart attack; and in April 1996, she fell and fractured her collarbone. Mother Teresa's most recent heart attack, August 1996, was complicated by a high fever, malaria, and weak lungs. But at this writing she is again active and working hard. "I have much to do and no time to ask myself if I feel well or not. I am in God's hands. I work for Him, and he will tell me when I should stop."

What will happen when Mother Teresa is gone? When confronted with this question, the tiny Albanese nun replies: "If my congregation is God's work, then even after my departure it will grow and develop for the good of the Church and for humanity. But if one day my nuns are no longer faithful to God, no longer do only His will, then I pray that my Order will be destroyed."

Once a very wealthy man asked Mother Teresa for her "business card." First replying she had no need, she thought the matter over and had cards printed with her favorite prayer, that of St. Francis: "Jesus is happy to come with us, as truth is happy to be spoken, as life to be lived, as light to be lit, as love is to be loved, as joy to be given, as peace to be spread."

Opposite page, a scene from Mother Teresa's Home for the Dying, in the shadow of the Kali Temple in Calcutta

Above, improvised homes in a Calcutta street

On right, a Sister of Charity cares for an abandoned child in Mother Teresa's Children's Center in Calcutta

In 1987, John Paul II asked Mother Teresa to found a center at the Vatican. On June 17 of that year, the Pope himself, in Mother Teresa's presence, laid the foundation stone for the Missionaries of Charity Refuge for Homeless Women, called "Dono di Maria" (Mary's Gift). In fact, it is located practically next door to St. Peter's Basilica (behind the Paul VI Hall where John Paul II holds his weekly audiences and beside Cardinal Ratzinger's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith). The entrance is through a tiny door in the middle of the ivy-covered Mura Leonianae or Leonine Walls. In this cheery place, run by gentle and friendly sisters from India and other countries, Rome's poorest women are welcomed, given food and lodging, and provided with medical assistance and emotional support. The center has a dormitory with bunk beds for approximately 70 women, a modern refectory for about 100 persons (men are also served at the noon meal), a large kitchen, sleeping rooms and chapel for the sisters, a small infirmary, modest sitting and meeting rooms, and, to one side but within the walls, the 15-century chapel of San Salvatore in a lovely green courtyard. At the June 17 ceremony, the Pope affirmed that the Dono di Maria shelter had been founded "in God's name and for His love: because love for Christ must necessarily involve us -- every one of us -- in sincere and profound love for our fellow men."