Meeting Mother Teresa

We were in Bombay visiting missionary friends on a very tight schedule in the process of making a documentary about “The Life of a Missionary”. We were on a “world tour” and were scheduled to visit many different missions in different countries.  We took a total of 40 flights in 3 months and came across some of the most touching missionary works that I had ever seen or heard of.  –People who were giving of themselves at no cost to help their fellow man.  Some of them were involved in the more social aspect of helping others, while others were reaching deep down into the hearts of drug addicts, prostitutes and the destitute to draw out their worth and pour into them the love of God.

I had already seen changed lives, healed bodies, and entire villages transformed by one or two people who just acted out the Gospel!

Many people have asked me over the years, “what’s the definition of a missionary?”. I always answer: “it’s someone who takes what he hears in church and walks it out on the street”. He is essentially a “disciple of Jesus Christ”. –One who not only talks the talk, but walks the walk). He is out there every day with the people, walking out the Gospel and teaching people how to make the Words of Jesus work in their lives.

If you have ever been to India, you know what a mind-wrenching cultural shock it is to arrive where the poorest of the poor live.  Overnight you are face to face with so  much poverty, so much need, so much sickness, so much ‘want’ that you are left nearly hopeless wondering, “where would one begin?”  We had already visited in the Bombay area, two outstanding missions that helped young people find purpose and devote their lives to helping others.

It was nearly 9:00 at night when we got back home, very tired, and one member of our filming crew said, “We should try to see if we could interview Mother Teresa!”  It sounded exciting, but not very feasible since the only day available on our schedule was the next day!  On his own, he proceeded to call the convent of the Little Sisters of Charity in Calcutta and when he got through to someone on the phone, he asked, “May I please speak to Mother Teresa?” And the person answered, “Yes, this is she!”  He could hardly believe our ears!  To find out that she, who had just been a Nobel Prize winner, was simple and humble enough to answer her own phone. After recomposing himself from the surprise of talking to Mother Teresa in person, he asked if we could fly from Bombay to Calcutta since we were on a filming crusade to interview different missionaries around the world and could we please have a few minutes of her time tomorrow (the next day).  The answer was a prompt, “Yes, of course, you must come to Calcutta!”

Three of us were on the flight the next morning and for us to make all of our connections upon return, we were going to have only 5 hours in Calcutta.  One hour travelling from the airport to the convent, one other hour to return, which meant only 3 hours at the convent. 

Upon arrival at the convent in Calcutta at 11:55 noon, we found out that Mother Teresa was just then on her way into the Chapel where she would spend from 12:00 to 3:00, as she does EVERY day, without fail and without distraction.  We got to see her for a couple of minutes before she went into the chapel and at that time she took all of our names and all of our kids’ names saying, “You’re right on time, I am going to the Chapel and I will pray for all of you!” … While we felt blessed by her concern and  generosity, it really wasn’t what we had come there for.  But nothing to do….!

Mother Superior of the Convent explained to us that those three hours, every day, was Mother’s time to give to no one else but God.  Our hearts sank but…she says, “Do you also believe in God?” We emphatically said, “Yes, of course!”  She said, “Then you must PRAY and perhaps I can ask her at mid-break if she would see you.”

There was nothing we could do but wait… and pray!

But while we were in the waiting room, we met a young Englishman who started to tell us that he had come from England to embrace Mother Teresa’s lifestyle and devotion for 6 months.  Apparently the convent had a program whereby one could come to live in Calcutta and partake of their activities and work with the poorest of the poor.

This young man had made an enormous amount of money during the dot com revolution, but it had left him empty and meaningless.  He had come to Calcutta to find himself and the true meaning for his life.

His testimony alone was worth our visit there.  He said that in England he was living “high on the hog”, eating the best food, drinking the best wine, meeting the best people and making the best deals and when he arrived in Calcutta, he started visiting the poorest of the poor, the forgotten, those who mean nothing to nobody and who are dying without anyone knowing they ever existed. The way he related the worth of a soul to us had each one of us in tears.  He said that even though he was returning to England he had no intention of returning to his old life and that he had found something much richer to live for and to give his life to than money and affluence.

We all listened to his testimony intensively for quite some time, and we so wished we had filmed it!

But all of a sudden the door of the waiting room swong open and it was Mother Superior who shouted, “Come, come, you must come now!  Mother will see you during the 15 minute break!”  We ran upstairs to the vestibule of the Chapel and started our interview with her.  At first she said, “Oh, I do not give interviews.  I don’t like to be filmed.”  But by that time, we were so desperate I suppose, that she yielded to our insistence and we were able to record nearly one hour of her speaking about how she saw the world going down, not just looking at the ever-growing poverty, but how the children were taken away from their parents by the media, by the games and by the fact that so many family values were being ripped out of the school curriculum.

I should mention that the Little Sisters of Jesus, as part of their confession of faith and devotion, have accepted to only have two “habits” for the entirety of their life’s service.  They wear one while the other is being washed.  One could not help but notice that Mother Teresa’s habit was stitched and repaired in so many different places.  It was “frail as a veil”, so much so that in some places it looked like the new thread was stronger than the habit itself.

She spoke with so much conviction, but not in her own words.  She quoted Bible verses almost every other sentence.  She believed with her whole heart the Word of God was the only way and the only truth to keep the world from straying and destroying itself.

She spoke with tears in her eyes about the welfare of children and how it is our RESPONSIBILITY to teach children to pray and to keep them from the world at all costs.  She said that while we spend so much to make sure that children have everything they need and want, we should instead take away all of the gadgets that distract from the parents having personal time with their children, teaching them the ways of God.  That is what makes the family unit strong, she said.

Mother Teresa was maligned by journalists, even as she passed away (if you can imagine).  There are people in this world who will try to find errors in everyone being a better person than themselves. And unfortunately it is the major trend in journalism nowadays.  But Mother Teresa was one who acted on her faith.  She is the one who went to the unloveable, the unlovely, and the poorest of the poor, and said, “Let us always meet each other with a smile, for a smile is the beginning of love.”  She said, “The moment you start judging people, you then have no time to love them.”  If some of us, at times, feel depressed by the ills of this world, we should look to Mother Teresa’s sample who made “Joy” her motto.  She said, “Joy is prayer, joy is strength, joy is love, joy is a net of love by which you can catch the souls of men.”  And she lived that joy.

We ended up spending a little over 1 hour with her. Such a MIRACULOUS

encounter in so many ways…

  It wasn’t all in the words that she shared with us, but perhaps even more so in the fruits of her labors of love.  As a parting gift, she gave us medallions for each and every one of our children, kissed them and blessed them.  And, yes, those remain with us, but even more living was her sample of giving love unconditionally and seeing all those who crossed her path as yet one more beautiful soul that God loves. And she was determined to be God’s messenger of love to that person.