By: Father Denis Egan
She is called the most beloved woman in the world. She seeks out the poor in whatever corner of the world they are gathered, to bring them love and sense of dignity. Honoured by nations, she looks astonishingly frail at the side of Prelates and Prime Ministers yet at 77 she still cleans the toilets and bathes the maggot-infested wounds of the dying and destitute. In Calcutta alone her Sisters of Charity have rescued some 50,000 of the poorest of the poor from its streets. In an aged that is absorbed in the pursuit of material wealth she stands as a sign of contradiction, and challenges the values of our secular worlds by her reverence for the Poor. The following account of her recent visit to the Philippines is based on a report by Fr. Denis Egan.
Arrives in Olongapo
As she stepped from Bishops Aniceto’s car in Olongapo, in the sweltering heat of the Philippines, her frail figure was immediately surrounded by an excited crowed. They were eager to shake her hand, but she was not at ease with the film star treatment. She took her rosary beads in the elongated fingers that were so accustomed to dressing wounds, and concentrated on her prayers.
Eyes on Tabernacle
Before Mass Mother Teresa, with her rosary beads still clasped in her left hand, clutched the altar with her right, and remained with her eyes fixed on the tabernacle. For her, devotion to the Eucharist goes with devotion to the poor. “Our Eucharist is incomplete,” she has said, “If it does not make us love and serve the poor.”
Start in the Home
She spoke during the Mass. “I have no gold or silver to give you, but I give you my sisters,” she said, and mentioned one of her favourite themes, that of love in the home. “Love begins at home; love lives at home,” she had said previously.. “Everybody today seems to be in such a terrible rush, anxious for greater developments and greater riches, so that children have very little time with their parents. The parents have very little time for each other, and in the home begins the disruption of the peace of the world.”
New Home
Mother Teresa had come to Olongapo to open another home for the destitute mother and destitute children. Columban Father Denis Egan had looked forward to this moment. Through the generosity of benefactors, the Columbans had purchased the house that was to be come the new hostel run by the Sisters of Charity. Initially it was to house twelve children and eight older girls. It was a proud moment for Columban Father, Denis Egan to be associated with Mother Teresa in this work. It is a work that extends now to almost as many countries as her 77 years.
Call Within a Call
It all began in Skopje, Albania, (Now part of modern Yugoslavia), where she was born on August 26, 1910. As a young girl she belonged to a group dedicated to Our Lady. The group was led by Croatian Jesuits, and it was with their guidance that she decided to join the Loreto Sisters in Bengal. For nearly twenty years she taught in the Loreto High School there. Then she received what she herself describes as a “call within a call”. She knew that her place was in the slums with the poorest of the poor. When she was released finally from her vows in 1949, she stepped out into the world with only five rupees in her pocket. She made her way to the poorest of part of Calcutta. She got a little medical training, found a place to stay, and begun her work. Happy at last with the outcast, the despised ones of society, she started a little school in the compound of a family in the slums. Gradually others came to know about her work and brought her things and money,” she said. I wanted to serve the poor purely for the love of God. I wanted to give the poor what the rich get for money.”
Surrender
Within a year others began to join her in the work. “One by one,” she said, the young women ‘surrendered themselves to God to serve the poorest of the poor’.
People Eaten by Rats
In the 1952 she opened the first Home for the Dying. The first woman that she picked up from the streets had been half eaten by rats and ants. She took her to the hospital but there they could do nothing for her. The very same day she discovered other literally dying on the streets. so she went straight to the municipality and asked them to give her a place where she could look after them. The health officer showed her an empty part of Hindu Temple. Within a day she had patients in there. Since then some 50,000 have been rescued from Calcutta’s streets.
We Want Them To Know They are Loved
“They die so admirably...so admirably in the peace of God. Up to now, our Sister and I myself have never yet seen or met a woman or a man who refused to ask to ask ‘pardon of God’, who refused to say ‘I love you, my God”. In famous TV interview with Malcolm Muggeridge she explained: “We want them to know that they are wanted. We want them to know that there are people who really love them.”
Four Sisters
She returned to Olongapo a few days later bringing with her four Sisters who would staff the hostel, Sister Anne Frances from India, two Filipinos, and one sister from Britain. As soon as they arrived they went to what would become the chapel, prayed together. They unpacked a few simple things and begun to arrange the rooms. They put habits out on the clothes line to dry.
Stark Poverty
They had washed them in Manila before journey. They are allowed only two, the one that they are wearing, and the one in the wash. The poverty of the sister stark. Mother Teresa has insisted that in order to understand and help those who lack everything her sisters must live like them. “We do not want to begin by serving the poor and little by little end up serving rich, like other religious orders in history.”
Who Are We To Judge
Her option for the poor is total, but it does not mean that she ignores the rich. “Who are we to judge the rich?” she asks. “Our task is to bring the rich and the poor together.”
We Each Give A Drop
All the accolades that she has won, from India’s Order of the Lotus to the Nobel Peace Prize, are for her simply‘recognition that the poor are our sisters and brothers. She confesses that all her work is just a drop in the ocean. Yet if that drop were missing the ocean would be less.