MOTHER TERESA: A BEAUTIFUL SAINT WITHOUT FAITH

Mother Teresa was as human as the rest of us. I know this to be true, because I read it in TIME magazine. She often doubted the existence of God, and felt that Jesus rarely heard her prayers. In fact, she even wondered if there was any sense in praying to a God that seemed not to care about her. I was initially shocked to learn this, because like many people: I see Mother Teresa as a woman of great spiritual strength and faith. The saint of the gutter, forever helping people that the world has given up on. But she was only human. She said so in a series of letters she'd written (and requested they be destroyed).

But the letters were preserved against her wishes. So now we discover that her loving smile was often a mask, and the beautiful words she often stated in public were not words she honestly felt in her heart. She suggested ways to make the world a more loving place, but often felt her words were insincere. She'd learned how to say all the right things, and smiled for the cameras when she was weeping inside.

Does this make Mother Teresa a hypocrite? No, it makes her human, and all the more remarkable. She was a saint without faith, and there are not very many of those. She continued to love the poorest of the poor (and help them even after her doctors had warned her that she was ruining her own health). She taught us that we all have the potential to become saints: that there really is nothing special about it: Give help where it is needed most; love people the world has given up on; any act of kindness (no matter how seemingly small) is better than doing nothing at all.

In short, she taught us to save the world by saving one person at a time. And that is how she lived her life. And to accomplish such a miracle without faith, makes her even more heroic in my mind. Mother Teresa was a saint, but she was a very human one: She moved mountains without faith. I know this to be true, because I read it in TIME magazine.

Essay © 2007 by Dylan Mitchell