| She had no children
of her own, but when she died, she was mourned the world over.
Gonxha Bojaxhiu, the future Mother Teresa, became mother to
the poorest of the poor in Calcutta, India. Although as a
Unitarian and irregular church-goer, I hold no deep religious
convictions, I was deeply moved by the extensive exhibit about
Mother Teresa at the Knights of Columbus Museum in New Haven.
Using large printed panels and photographs that cover several
rooms, the exhibit traces her beginnings, born in 1910 in
Skopje, the capital at that time of the Kosovo province
of the Ottoman Empire, later to become part of Yugoslavia.
It was a multiethnic and multireligious city. Gonxha, which
means flower bud, was the youngest of five children. Her
father, Nikola, was a merchant, and her mother, Drana, was
a woman of deep faith who greatly influenced her daughter.
When her father died, her strong-willed mother provided
for the family by weaving and selling Albanian linen.
When Teresa was 18, she left home and entered the Sisters
of Loreto in Ireland. Her mother’s parting words were,
“Put your hand in his hand and walk all alone with
him and never look back.” She never saw her mother
again. She was given a new name as a postulate in Ireland
at the Loreto Sisters, the Irish branch of an order which
had foundations in Bengal, India.
Sister Teresa applied to go to India, and after two years
as a novitiate, she made her temporary vows. At first, she
taught in a Bengal school for girls. In 1937, she took her
vows for life, and became principal of St. Mary’s
School. She became fluent in English, Hindu and Bengali.
In 1942, the British army requisitioned the school as a
military hospital during the war.
The great turning point in Sister Teresa’s life came
in 1943, when the famous famine in Bengal took the lives
of more than 2 million and Gandhi’s nonviolent movement
for independence was gaining strength. Then, in September
1946, during a train ride from Calcutta to Darjeeling, Mother
Teresa received an inspiration or a call from Jesus in which
she was asked to found a new religious community. After
a long year of waiting for permission, the archbishop allowed
her to write to the Loreto superior general, and in August
1948, she left the Loreto convent and stepped alone into
the slums.
By January ’49, this diminutive but determined woman
opened a school and medical dispensary in the Motjhil slum,
using only volunteer help. By June 1950, she had a community
of 12 nuns, and a year later, had opened 11 new centers.
“We cannot let a child of God die like an animal in
the gutter,” she said.
In 1952, she opened Nirmal Hriday (Pure Heart), where the
homeless sick and dying could be cared for. One of them
said, “I have lived like an animal in the street,
but I am going to die like an angel, loved and cared for.”
The exhibit continues with photos of her home for unwanted
children, her leprosy center, her first center outside India,
in Venezuela, and with her increasing worldwide recognition,
homes in Rome, Tanzania, Australia, East Germany and the
Soviet Union. A home for AIDS patients opened in 1985.
The exhibit also tells us about the darkness and questioning
that came to her life after her special call from Jesus.
At times, she felt rejected and at a loss, but she finally
came to believe that her pain and uncertainty were part
of his pain, suffered on Earth.
Eventually, Mother Teresa received more than 700 awards
and honors, including the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979, although
her simple, monastic-like room (reproduced at the exhibit)
remained the same. As she aged, she suffered from heart
disease, malaria, pneumonia and bone fractures, but her
thoughts were always of others.
She said, shortly before her death on Sept. 5, 1997, “On
the last day, Jesus will say, whatever you neglected to
do unto one of the least of these you neglected to do unto
me.” Her legacy lives on today in the religious community
she founded, the Missionaries of Charity, which has more
than 700 houses of refuge throughout the world.
The photograph of this remarkable woman, her face weathered
and worn, but the eyes bright with hope, is an image I shall
remember for a very long time.
Jean Cherni is founder of Senior
Living Solutions, a retirement advisory service. Contact
her at jeancherni@sbcglobal.net or 15 The Ponds, Branford
06405.
H. Pearce Company REALTORS®
is a full-service real estate company with more than 100
agents and branch offices in greater New Haven and the Shoreline.
Corporate and & Commercial offices are located in North
Haven, where the company was founded in 1958. All listings
can be found in color on the web at: www.hpearce.com. |
