Pro-Life Hero – St. Teresa of Calcutta

This is the third in a series of articles about “pro-life heroes”.   Their outstanding example shows us how heroic obedience to the Gospel can result in a single person transforming the society and culture around them.  Their lives are foundation stones for the culture of life we are trying to build! Read about our first hero St. Basil the Great [here], and our second hero St. Vincent de Paul [here].

The two simple words “Mother Teresa” immediately evoke in the minds of people worldwide her tremendous love for and service of the poorest of the poor, the outcasts and rejects of society, not least her passionate care for unwanted children.

One of her innumerable pro-life statements, showing her love for the unborn as well as for their persecutors, reaches out eloquently to people and peoples who utilise, tolerate and even celebrate abortion:

“It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish”. ^[i]

Her early years

Anjezё (Agnes) Gonxha Bojaxhiu was born 26 August 1910 in Skopje (then part of what would become Albania a couple of years later, and now part of Macedonia).  The youngest of three children, she was a fervently faithful child in a devout Catholic family.

Her father Nikola died when she was eight.  Her mother Drane provided for her family in his absence by developing a textile enterprise, while also guiding her children.  Drane remained a great influence on the character and formation of Agnes, who first heard God’s call to the religious life at the age of twelve while on pilgrimage to Lourdes with her mother.

The Nobel Peace Prize website, celebrating Mother Teresa’s 1979 award, picks up the story of her journey to the slums of Calcutta:

“At the age of twelve, she felt strongly the call of God. She knew she had to be a missionary to spread the love of Christ. At the age of eighteen she left her parental home in Skopje and joined the Sisters of Loreto, an Irish community of nuns with missions in India. After a few months’ training in Dublin she was sent to India, where on May 24, 1931, she took her initial vows as a nun. From 1931 to 1948 Mother Teresa taught at St. Mary’s High School in Calcutta, but the suffering and poverty she glimpsed outside the convent walls made such a deep impression on her that in 1948 she received permission from her superiors to leave the convent school and devote herself to working among the poorest of the poor in the slums of Calcutta.” ^[ii]

The “call within a call”

It was while travelling by train to Darjeeling for her annual retreat that she received what she described as her “call within a call.”  Jesus’ thirst for love and for souls took hold of her heart, and the desire to satiate His thirst became her driving force for the rest of her earthly life.  ^[iii]

After gaining permission to begin her new work, and wearing the famous white Sari edged with blue for the first time, she went straight to work in the slums of Calcutta, seeking out the most destitute and the neediest among the poor, desiring to quench Our Lord’s thirst for love and for souls.

The Missionaries of Charity were given official recognition in the Archdiocese of Calcutta on 7 October 1950.   One at a time, her former pupils had already joined her in this work of love. 

In her earthly lifetime, the Missionaries of Charity would grow to comprise thousands of religious, with a presence in over one hundred countries.  She herself became a bold prophet in our time.

The Vatican website summarises her life and service this way:

“The whole of Mother Teresa’s life and labour bore witness to the joy of loving, the greatness and dignity of every human person, the value of little things done faithfully and with love, and the surpassing work of friendship with God.”  ^[iv]

She once gave a personal testimony:

“By blood, I am Albanian. By citizenship, an Indian. By faith, I am a Catholic nun. As to my calling, I belong to the world. As to my heart, I belong entirely to the Heart of Jesus.” ^[v]

On 5 September, Mother Teresa’s earthly life ended.   Her eternal heavenly life is assured; Pope Francis proclaimed her a Saint of the Church on September 4, 2016.

A diminutive prophet and a servant of the least

Time and again, Mother Teresa fearlessly proclaimed the Gospel of Life before the most powerful people on earth.  When God gave her the platform, this tiny Albanian nun used it to great effect.  On 3 February, 1994, Mother Teresa spoke at the National Prayer Breakfast in the US, in Washington DC. It was attended by the strongly pro-abortion President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton, the First Lady.

Mother Teresa said:

“Many people are also concerned about all the violence in this great country of the United States. These concerns are very good. But often these same people are not concerned with the millions who are being killed by the deliberate decision of their own mothers. And this is what is the greatest destroyer of peace today – abortion which brings people to such blindness.”  ^[vi]

Peggy Noonan, best-selling author and columnist for The Wall Street Journal and present at the prayer breakfast, described the audience’s response including the reaction of Bill and Hillary Clinton in an article in Crisis magazine:

“Well, silence. Cool deep silence in the cool round cavern for just about 1.3 seconds. And then applause started on the right hand side of the room, and spread, and deepened, and now the room was swept with people applauding, and they would not stop for what I believe was five or six minutes. As they clapped they began to stand, in another wave from the right of the room to the centre and the left. But not everyone applauded. The president and first lady, seated within a few feet of Mother Teresa on the dais, were not applauding. Nor were the vice president and Mrs. Gore. They looked like seated statues at Madame Tussaud’s. They glistened in the lights and moved not a muscle, looking at the speaker in a determinedly semi-pleasant way.” ^[vii]

In 1979, whilst accepting the Nobel Peace Prize “for her work for bringing help to suffering humanity” she spoke about when the unborn John the Baptist recognised the unborn Jesus:

“As soon as he came in her life – immediately she went in haste to give that good news, and as she came into the house of her cousin, the child – the unborn child – the child in the womb of Elizabeth, leapt with joy. He was that little unborn child, was the first messenger of peace.  ^[viii]

And later in the same speech, she said:

“… but I feel the greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a direct war, a direct killing – direct murder by the mother herself. And we read in the Scripture, for God says very clearly: Even if a mother could forget her child – I will not forget you – I have carved you in the palm of my hand. We are carved in the palm of His hand, so close to Him that unborn child has been carved in the hand of God. And that is what strikes me most, the beginning of that sentence, that even if a mother could forget something impossible – but even if she could forget – I will not forget you. And today the greatest means – the greatest destroyer of peace is abortion.”  ^[ix]

Some final words for us all

St. Teresa of Calcutta was a great prophet, pointing out the way to God on the greatest issues facing humanity. But, like her beloved Jesus, she also spoke to each one of us individually, showing how God guides each one of us and strengthens us to do what we are called to do to change the world for the better.

When receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Ronald Reagan at the White House on 20 June, 1985, she spoke to all of us, from the US president and his family as well as to every family on earth:

“And my gratitude to you, President, and your family and to your people. It’s my prayer for you that you may grow in holiness to this tender love for the poorest of the poor. But this love begins at home, in your own family, and it begins by praying together. Prayer gives a clean heart, and a clean heart can see God. And if you see God in each other, you will have love, peace, joy together. And works of love are works of peace. And love begins at home.” ^[x]

St Theresa of Calcutta, pray for us!

FOOTNOTES:

[i] Dr Marcellino D’Ambrosio. Mother Teresa on Abortion  
crossroadsinitiative.com/media/articles/mother-teresa-abortion/

[ii] The Nobel Prize, Mother Teresa – Biographical
nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1979/teresa/biographical/

[iii] EWTN (referencing L’Osservatore Romano) – Answering a Call Within a Call
ewtn.com/catholicism/library/answering-a-call-within-a-call

[iv] Vatican Website – Mother Teresa of Calcutta (1910 – 1997) vatican.va/news_services/liturgy/saints/ns_lit_doc_20031019_madre-teresa

[v] Vatican Website – Mother Teresa of Calcutta (1910 – 1997) vatican.va/news_services/liturgy/saints/ns_lit_doc_20031019_madre-teresa

[vi] Crossroads Initiative website –Mother Teresa’s National Prayer Breakfast Message
crossroadsinitiative.com/media/articles/mother-teresas-national-prayer-breakfast-message

[vii] Peggy Noonan, Still Small Voice (Crisis Magazine – February 1, 1998)  peggynoonan.com/71

[viii] The Nobel Prize, Mother Teresa – Nobel Lecture  nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1979/teresa/lecture/

[ix] The Nobel Prize, Mother Teresa – Nobel Lecture  nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1979/teresa/lecture/

[x] Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum – Remarks on Presenting the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Mother Teresa
reaganlibrary.gov/archives/speech/remarks-presenting-presidential-medal-freedom-mother-teresa