Today on Listen Up TV, a dark secret only revealed ten years after her
death….Mother Teresa and her doubts about God.
Today
we head out to explore a journey of darkness. How could it be that our
generation’s most famous Christian woman, Mother Teresa worried that
God had abandoned her?
Mother Teresa came from Albania, a
country where communism banned belief in God. But by age 12 she knew
she was chosen by God for service to the poor. By 18, she left for a
Calcutta convent. Nine years later she made her vow to be a “spouse of
Christ” and began her journey to establishing the Missionaries of
Charity. She opened more than 160 centers of care in India, by her
death at age 87; she had homes for the destitute and dying in over 100
countries, and thousands of nuns to carry out the work. She had won the
Nobel Peace Prize, and begged President Bush and Saddam Hussein to not
go to war over Iraq. Vowing to own nothing, and with only a simple
Indian dress, a veil, and one pair of sandals, she was able to
influence decades of conversation about what does it mean to follow
Jesus.
Today - We’ll ask what is the Catholic Church
thinking in releasing dark secrets Mother Teresa begged to be destroyed
and talk with the priest who culled through Mother Teresa’s private
letters and diary of angst and loneliness. We’ll also visit with a
science writer whose work studying the brain waves of nuns sheds some
light on doubting Teresa’s darkness. And what about Mother Teresa’s
monthly habit of time spent with a spiritual director? Listen Up will
take you on a journey to a Jesuit spiritual director to examine what do
we do when we doubt God Loves us.
Mary Rose Bacani and Matthew Harrison are Salt and Light TV Producers
for ‘Focus,’ a Catholic current affairs program. They also
specialize in Catholic thought and life.
DENYSE O’LEARY
The spiritual life is not the same thing as the emotional life. So says
our guest; author and journalist, Denyse O’Leary. She explores
this issue together with neuroscientist Mario Beauregard, in their new
book, The Spiritual Brain.
For each of her 50 plus years of working in the slums, Mother Teresa
was required to report monthly to a spiritual director about what was
going on in her life. How does one access answers when
they’re faced with doubt? Listen Up went for a visit
at Loyola House – one of many spiritual retreat centers available
to the public - to talk with Spiritual Director, and Jesuit priest,
Father Bill Clark, who helps people on such journeys.
FR. BRIAN KOLODIEJCHUK, M.C., Ph.D., was born in Winnipeg, Canada. He
met Mother Teresa in 1977 and was associated with her until her death
in 1997. He joined the Missionaries of Charity Fathers at the time of
their foundation in 1984. Fr. Brian is postulator of the Cause of
Beatification and Canonization of Mother Teresa of Calcutta and
director of the Mother Teresa Center and author of Mother Teresa, Come
Be My Light.
What struck me
about this look at Mother Teresa today is that she didn’t sit in
isolation about her doubts. Every month she was required to write about
her journey to a spiritual director who helped process her questions.
Thus the private writings we now have in Mother Teresa, Come Be My
Light, a very encouraging book. Mother Teresa was so committed to
connection with other Christians that she also created a second self; a
person who would pray full time for her. Each of her nuns was assigned
a second self, a prayer partner to go the distance with them in their
demanding work. The saint of the slums did what Christians have been
commanded to do for centuries; “love each other.” When God seemed
silent to Mother Teresa, God’s people, God’s church, God’s scripture
was not. Her belief was anchored by facts, not feelings.
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On April 30, 2005 Lorna was privileged to receive an honorary Doctorate of Christian Ministries from Canada's largest Christian university, Trinity Western University. Lorna was recognized for the witness and leadership that Listen Up TV has provided in public messaging: "a leader in the voice of evangelical life in Canada."
