I cannot say if or when the Vatican will give Mother Teresa sainthood, but in truth, the 
people of the world have already done so."  
Mother Teresa’s biographer


Mother Teresa became immortal on September 5, 1997, a few days after her 
eighty-seventh birthday.  She was born Agnes Bojaxhiu of Albanian parents on August 
27, 1910 in the city of Skopie, when it was under Ottoman Turkish rule.  Today, the city 
of Skopie is the capitol of Macedonia.


When Agnes Bojaxhiu was a little schoolgirl, she became inspired by reports from 
Yugoslav Jesuits who were helping the needy in Bengal.  It was during this period in time 
that prompted her calling toward helping the poor and the destitute.  She decided to make 
India her mission field.


Agnes was eighteen when she joined the Sisters of Loretto, a community of Irish nuns 
who ran schools in India.  When she entered the convent, she decided to take the name 
Teresa.  After learning English at an abbey in Dublin, she started teaching geography in a 
convent school in Calcutta.


In nineteen-forty-six, she became ill with tuberculosis and was sent to a mountain retreat 
to recuperate.  While en route, she decided to give up everything and follow the path of 
our Lord.  After a year of repeated requests, Pope Pius XII finally submitted and allowed 
her to leave her religious order.


In nineteen-fifty, she established the Order of the Missionaries of Charity. She started by 
teaching the slum children of Calcutta whose parents were too poor to send their children 
to school.  And as the old saying goes,  ”Out of the mouths of babes . . . ,” the children 
started calling her “Mother Teresa” and that is who she became. 


On one occasion while walking along a street in Calcutta, Mother Teresa came upon a 
dying woman half eaten by maggots and rats.  Instead of walking past, as many before her 
had done, she sat next to her stroking her head and consoling her till she died.


She came to the aid of the hungry in Ethiopia, the radiation victims of Chernobyl, the 
downtrodden in South Africa’s squalid towns, and Armenia’s earthquake victims, to 
name a few.  The order she established opened one of the first homes for Aids victims.


During her lifetime, the monumental work she accomplished, combined with all of the 
good she influenced along the way, would fill volumes, if not libraries.


As a recipient at the Nobel Peace Prize ceremonies in 1979, she wore the same humble 
garment that she adopted to identify herself with the poor when she founded the 
Missionaries of Charity in 1950.  The monies she received from this award, along with all 
the rest she received throughout her lifetime, went to finance her charitable calling.


In life she descended to the lowest levels of existence to reach the impoverished and 
underprivileged.


Her calling of love and servitude transcended all religious barriers and in passing, she has 
ascended to the highest pinnacle of admiration and respect from the fragmented and 
saddened world she lived in.


The number of sisters in her religious order in 1957 numbered 62.  In 1979, when she 
received the Nobel Peace Prize, her order had attracted 1,800 nuns and 120,000 lay 
workers, servicing more than 80 centers in India and an excess of another 100 more 
throughout the world--this included more than 53,000 lepers.


Physically, Mother Teresa was short in height and less than a hundred pounds in weight. 
Yet there is no form of mortal reasoning that can calibrate the magnitude of the enormous 
influences that her legacy of love has left behind.


At one time, Mother Teresa said, "By blood and origin, I am Albanian, my citizenship is 
Indian, and I am a Catholic nun."  Truly, this great woman saw no division of people and 
religion in her heart.  When interviewed by experience-hardened reporters, she would say, 
"Every child is God’s child," but she would force the reporters to their knees in prayer 
before giving such interviews.   She denied herself of all material luxuries and gave of 
herself to help others.


The government of India further confirmed Mother Teresa’s unselfish and loving 
servitude by setting a precedent in giving her a state funeral--a precedent that has never 
been offered to a non-Indian throughout their history.


By personal example of self-sacrificing, Mother Teresa proved beyond any shadow of 
doubt that love is a God force and that the power of love is in the giving and not the 
taking.  And as long as our world survives, the memory of this gracious, loving, and 
universally holy woman, will never be forgotten.

             
Joseph Vosbikian