|
Mother
Theresa
Agnes
Gonxha Bojaxhiu was born august 26, 1910; baptized
august 27 in Skopje, in Macedonia. Her family
belongs to the Albanian community. They are
catholic, though the majority of the Albanians are
muslim there. The Turkish Empire is ruling the
country. Her father is a businessman. He owns a
building company and is connected to a food shop. He
travelled a lot, was multi-lingual and very
interested in politics. He was member of the
community council. He, Kolė, thought Agnes her
first lessons in charity, together with Drana, his
wife and Agnes' mother.
Totally unexpected, when Agnes was 9, her father
died. It was 1919 and Drana had to raise her three
children, Aga (1904), Lazar (1907) and Gonxha (1910)
alone. To foresee in their needs she sew wedding
dresses, made embroidery and worked hard. In spite
of all this, she made time for the education of her
children. They prayed every evening, went to church
every day, prayed the rosary every day in may and
assisted the service for the Holy Virgin. A great
and warm attention went also to the poor and needy
who came to knock at the door. During the holidays a
stay in the pilgrimage place of Letnice, where Our
Lady was venerated, was a custom for the family.
Agnes liked to be in church, she liked to read and
to pray and to sing. Here mother also took care of
an alcoholistic women in the neighbourhood. She went
to wash and feed her twice a day and she also took
care of a widow with 6 children. When Drana could
not go, Agnes went to do this charitable work. And
when the widow died, the children were raised in the
house as if they were family. Lazar won a
scholarship in Austria, Aga followed commercial
school and Agnes went to the Lyceum. She studied
well. Together with Aga she was in the Choir, she
was a soprano, Aga second voice. She also played the
mandolin.
A great part of their time also went to the Legion
of Mary. She helped a father, who had difficulties
with the language, to teach catechism and read a lot
about Slovenian and Croatian missionaries in India.
At twelve she felt for the first time the desire to
spend her life for Gods' work, to give it to Him and
to let Him decide. But how could she be sure?
She prayed a lot over it and talked about it with
her sister and her mother. And also the father to
whom she confessed she asked: "How can I be
sure?" He answered: "through your JOY. If
you feel really happy by the idea that God might
call you to serve Him, Him and your neighbour, then
this is the evidence that you have a call." And
he added: "the deep inner joy that you feel is
the compass that indicates your direction in
life".
At 18 it is the day! The decision was made. The last
two years she assisted several religious retreats in
Letnice and it was clear to her that she would be a
missionary for India. On Assumption day in 1928 she
went to Letnice to pray for Our Lady's blessing
before leaving. She was going to join the Sisters of
Our Lady of Loreto, who were very active in India.
September 25 she leaves, accompanied to the station
by the whole community: friends, schoolmates,
neighbours, young and old and of course her mother
and her sister Aga (who will be later a translator
and a radio speakerin). And everybody weeps. (Mainly
from the book: "A life: Mother Teresa, Lush
Gjergi, Albania).
She travels over Zagreb, to Austria, Switzerland,
France to London and then to the abbey close to
Dublin where the mother house of the Loreto Sisters
is. Gonxha learns to speak English and is trained in
religious life. She receives the clothes of a sister
and chooses the name of Sister Teresa, in memory of
the Little Teresa of Lisieux, where they stopped on
the way to London. In the mean time her papers get
ready and 1928 on december the 1st the crossing to
India starts: the country of her dreams. It is a
long and tiring journey. Some more sisters are on
board but the main group is anglican. For weeks they
cannot attend mass or receive communion. Not on
Christmas either. But they make a crib, pray the
rosary and sing Christmas songs.
In the beginning of 1929 they reach Colombo, then
Madras and finally Calcutta. The journey continues
to Darjeeling, at the feet of the Himalayas, where
the young sister will accomplish her training. On
may 23, 1929 she is accepted as a novice and two
years later she makes her first vows. Immediately
after that she is send to Bengali to help the
sisters in the little hospital with the care for
sick, starving and helpless mothers. She is touched
by the endless misery which is there.
She is send to Calcutta to study to become a
teacher. Whenever she can she helps in the care for
the sick. When her study is finished, she is named
to be teacher and has to cross the city every day.
The first work was to clean the classroom. Quickly
the children learned to love her for her enthusiasm
and her tenderness and their number raised to three
hundred. In another part of the city there were one
hundred little students. She saw where they lived
and what they ate. For her care and her love, they
soon called her "ma". Sundays, whenever
there was time, she went to visit this family's.
On may 24 in 1937 she makes her final vows in
Darjeeling. She is named headmaster of a secondary
school for middle class Bengali girls in the centre
of Calcutta. She was there teacher for history and
geography for some time. Close to the institute is
one of the great slums of Calcutta. Sister Teresa
cannot close her eyes: who cares for this poor
living in the streets? The great charity that speaks
through her mothers letters, reminds her of the
basic call: to care for the poor.
The Legion of Mary is also active in this school.
With the girls, Sister Teresa goes regularly to the
hospitals, the slums, the poor. They do not only
pray. They talk seriously about what they see and
what they do. The Belgian Walloon jesuit, Father
Henry, who was the spiritual director, was a great
inspiration in this work. He will direct Sister
Teresa for years. Under his inspiration the desire
grows to do more for the poor, but how?
With all this in her head she leaves for retreat to
Darjeeling on the 10th of september. "The most
important journey of my life" she said
afterwards. It was then that she really heard Gods'
voice. His message was clear: she had to leave the
convent to help the poorest of the poor and to live
with them. "It was an order, a duty, an
absolute certainty. I knew what to do, but I did not
know how". The 10th of september is so
important in the Society that this day is called
"Inspiration day".
Sister Teresa prayed, talked with some other
sisters, asked her superior, who sent her to see the
archbishop of Calcutta, Mgr. Perrier. She explained
to him her vocation, but he refused her the
permission. He talked it over with father Henry, who
knew Sister Teresa well. They considered thoroughly
the problems: India was about to be independent and
Sister Teresa was a European! What were the
political and other dangers? Would Rome approve this
decision? The bishop told Sister Teresa to pray over
this decision for at least a year or to join the
Daughters of Saint Anna, sisters wearing a dark blue
sari and working among the the poor. Sister Teresa
did not consider this the right response for her.
She wanted to live among the poor.
When after a year Sister Teresa renewed her
intention, the archbishop wanted to grant her the
permission but decided it would be better to ask the
permission from Rome and from the mother general in
Dublin. This decision took a long time.
In august 1948 she received the permission to leave
the Loreto community under the condition to keep the
vows of poverty, purity and obedience. She is 38
when she says goodbye to her sisters and religious
Loreto robe, to change it for a cheap white and blue
sari. First she goes to Patna to follow a nursing
training with the sisters there. It is obvious to
her that she can only help the poor in their dirty,
sickening habitation if she herself knows how to
prevent and cure. This medical training is
indispensable for the fulfilment of her new call.
The superior in Patna, a doctor, gives her good
advice when Sister Teresa talks about how she wants
to live among the poor and how she wishes to care
for them. When Sister Teresa says that she wants to
live on rice and salt, like the poor, the superior
answers that this would be the best way to hinder
herself in following her call: this kind of life
demands a strong and good health.
Back in Calcutta, Sister Teresa goes in the slums
and the streets, to talk with the poor, to help
them. All she has is a piece of soap and five
roepies. She helps to wash the babies, to clean the
wounds. The poor people are astonished: Who is this
european lady in that poor sari? She speaks fluently
Bengali! And she helps them wash, clean and care!
Soon she starts to teach the poor children how to
read and write, how to wash and to have some
hygiene. Later it will be possible to hire a small
place to make a school.
She herself sleeps with the Sisters of the Poor. God
is her great refuge for strength and material
support. And He is: always she finds the right
medicine, clothes, food and a place to receive the
poor to be able to help them. At noon children
receive a cup of milk and a piece of soap, when they
come regularly, but they also hear about God, who is
love and who - contrarily to their obvious reality -
loves them, really loves them.
One day a Bengalise girl, from a well-off family and
former student of Sister Teresa, wants to stay with
Sister Teresa and help her. This is a touching
moment. But Sister Teresa is realistic: she speaks
about the full poverty, about all the disagreeable
aspects of the work which is hers. She proposes the
girl to wait some time.
The 19th of march 1949 the girl comes back with no
jewels and in a poor dress. The decision was made.
She was the first to join Sister Teresa and took her
girls' name: Agnes. Other girls follow: in may they
were three, in november five, next year seven. And
Sister Teresa prayed fervently for more vocations to
the Lord and to Our Lady. There was a lot of work.
The sisters raised early in the morning, prayed a
long time, had adoration and attended mass to find
in their spiritual life the strength to do the
material work in the service of the poor. Thank God,
a certain Mister Gomes offered the top floor of his
house to Sister Teresa for her first community. In
this year also Sister Teresa takes the Indian
nationality.
Sister Teresa sees the community grow and knows she
can think seriously about starting a congregation.
For the first constitutions she asks the advice of
two from her first helpers: Father Julien Henry s.j.
and Father Celest Van Exem s.j. The last reading was
done by father P. De Gheldere. The
"Constitutions of the Society of the
Missionaries of Charity" could be presented to
the archbishop, who would send them for approval to
Rome.
Early in autumn the papal approval arrived and 7th
of October 1950, feast of the Holy Rosary, the
foundation was celebrated in the chapel of the
sisters. The archbishop celebrated mass and father
Van Exem read the foundation papers. That moment
there were 12 sisters. Every year hundreds of
sisters over the world celebrate on the feast day of
Our Lady of the Rosary the foundation of the
Congregation. Not even five years after this day the
congregation became papal, this means that they
depend straight from the pope.
It is basic in the Rule of the Society that the
sisters, out of love for Jesus, devote themselves
out of their free will, to the service of the
poorest of the poor and this is as a fact, their
fourth vow. This is their way to live and spread the
gospel and work for the salvation and the
sanctification of the poor.
While the number of poor and sick that asked for
help was increasing, the admiration for the free
devotion of the sisters was growing as well. Find a
suitable house to accept the increasing number of
sisters was a real necessity. After a novena to
Saint Cecilia the solution came: a muslim leaving
town to Pakistan sold his big house for a cheap
price and this became the famous Mother house, Lower
Circular Road 54A.
The postulants first came from Bengaly, then from
all over India and finally from all over the world.
The foundress herself was novice mistress. For the
spiritual training she asked one of the fathers, but
for the matters of the house and the Community, it
was clear, this was not his responsibility. She did
not want an interference from outside in the inside
matters.
The first confession father was father Edward Le
Joly s.j. Like the other jesuits he was from Belgian
origin. He had a good contact and a good co-working
and wrote some of the first and most respected books
about Mother Teresa and her Missionaries of Charity.
While the society grew in work and number Mother
kept praying for vocations and the work kept
growing. Houses were opening and some closing down
from one day to another for one or another
political, social or security reason. The society is
very much alive and moving. Mother Teresa went all
over the world to help people, rescue children,
advise her sisters; to organize and to talk. More
and more she was asked to address words to a group
of sometimes 'ordinary' sometimes very exquisite
crowds. In spite of the fact that her message is
often the same, can be captured in few sentences and
that she certainly has many times a quite
"traditional" point of view, she is
listened to carefully. In spite of her age she
continues to search means to help the poor people
all over the world and she helps with the means she
has. In every continent, even in Russia her sisters
are present in their service to the lost, for the
love of Jesus. In 1992 by the election of the New
Superior general, she is prepared to hand over the
responsibility. But she is re-elected. When in 1996
her health starts to fail seriously, due to her
heart getting worn out by love and action she
expresses the wish not to continue. On march 13th
1997 the assembly of sisters elect Sister Nirmala to
continue the beautiful work, for the love of Jesus.
On september 5th 1997, late in the evening around
9.30 h, Mother Teresa goes to Heaven in the Mother
house in Calcutta. Totally finished and worn out, as
she had given herself totally, wholeheartedly,
freely and unconditionally to the service of the
poorest of the poor, for the love of Jesus.
source:
https://www.tisv.be/mt/life.htm#success
|
