Agnese Gonxhe Bojaxhiu is
Mother Teresa’s real name. She was born in Uskub, then Ootoman Empire, now Skopje, the capital
of Macedonia on August 26th 1910. She was baptized on August 27th that she accepted as her true birthday. She lost her father when she eight years old. Her mother brought her up as a Roman Catholic. Since childhood, she was interested with the life of missionaries, and at 12 she dedicated her life to the cause of religion. At 18 she left home and joined the Sisters of Loreto as a missionary and detached herself from her mother and sister.
She was sent to Loreto Abbey situated in Rathfarnham, Ireland, where she learned English language. She traveled to India in 1929. She commenced her novitiate training in Darjeeling, West Bengal. On May 24th 1931 she took the first oath as a nun and took the name Teresa. While engaged as a teacher in Loreto Convent School in Calcutta. She took the solemn oath on 14th May 1937.
The famine of 1943 and the Hindu-Muslim riot in 1946, which changed her completely with an experience that she described as “The call within the call”. This experience happened during the journey of her annual retreat to Darjeeling from Calcutta on September 10, 1946. She narrated the call as an order from the Almighty to live among the poor and help them. She left her job in 1948 and started living among poor with missionary work. Early days were so tough that she often was tempted to go back in her comfortable life of Loreto. She withstood the arduous call with determination, abandoned her traditional habits of Loreto days, changed her dress to a white cotton sari with blue border, and took Indian citizenship. Initial area of work was the slums of Calcutta, and a school was established in Motijhil (A locality inside the city). Her attention focused to the needs of
destitute and starving.
Her personal diary reveals her agonizing mind in the first year of charity work. At that time she did not have any income whatsoever, and had to beg for food and supplies for herself and the poor. She mentioned in her diary, “Our Lord wants me to be a free nun covered with the poverty of the cross. Today I learned a good lesson. The poverty of the poor must be so hard for them. While looking for a home I walked and walked till my arms and legs ached. I thought how much they must ache in body and soul, looking for a home, food and health. Then the comfort of Loreto
came to tempt me. 'You have only to say the word and all that will be yours again,' the Tempter kept on saying ... Of free choice, my God, and out of love for you, I desire to remain and do whatever be your Holy will in my regard. I did not let a single tear come.”
Teresa started the Diocesan Congregation with the permission of Vatican on 7th October, 1950. Eventually it became the Missionaries of Charity. In the beginning the Missionaries of Charity had just 13 members in Kolkata, and now it has more than 4000 Nuns running orphanages, AIDs Hospices, and charity centers all over the world. The organization also extends its hands to victims of natural calamities, and refugees as and when required. Apart from this Mother Teresa opened Kalighat Home for Dying, where the poor died peacefully. For leprosy patients, many centers in Calcutta were opened for free distribution of medicines, bandages, and food. Nirmal Sishu Bhavan is another of her creation, where lost children were given shelter, and upbringing.
She completed the task of opening charity centers all over India by 1960. The first of such house outside India was opened in Venezuela in 1965 with five sisters. There after it spread in Africa, Asia, Europe, and finally America.
Her vision extended further establishing Missionaries of Charity Brothers in 1963, Missionaries of Charity Sisters in 1976, and Missionaries of Charity Fathers (Priests) in 1984 with Father Joseph Langford. Today the Missionaries of Charity operates in 600 missions spread over 120 countries having 450 Brothers and 5000 Nuns.
Mother also faced lots of criticism in varying nature from a range of people like Christopher Hitchens, Michael Parenti, Aroup Chatterjee, and Vishva Hindu Parishad, a Hindu Organization, for proselytizing.
Mother had her first heart attack in 1983, the second in 1989, and a pace maker was installed in her. She broke her collar bone in 1996. She had a heart surgery in 1996. She relinquished the responsibility of Missionaries of Charity on 13th March, 1997 due to severe health problem. In the same year on September 5th she died. She was beatified by the Pope John Paul II and was honoured with the title “Blessed Teresa of Calcutta.”
India’s highest civilian award Bharat Ratna was conferred on her in 1980, and prior to that she was also bestowed with Padma Sri and Jawaharlal Nehru award for International Understanding. Listless awards and recognition she received all over the world. Ramon Magsaysay award she received in 1962 for International Understanding and the Noble Peace Prize in 1979 for work in the struggle to overcome poverty and distress.
Through a poll in the United States she was ranked as the “Most Admired Person’ of 20th century.