INDEPTH: MOTHER TERESA
Mother Teresa, 1910-1997
Lani Krantz, CBC News Online | October 16, 2003
Mother Teresa of Calcutta was born on August 27, 1910, as Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu in the present-day Republic of Macedonia. She was the youngest child of Albanian parents Nikolla and Dranafila Bojaxhiu. She took her first communion at the age of five and was confirmed at the age of six. Agnes Gonxha's father, Nikolla, died when she was eight years old.
She left home at the age of 18 and joined the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Ireland. In September 1928, she took her initial vows as a nun. The Sisters of Loreto named her Mary Teresa after St. Thérèse of Lisieux. Four months later she left Ireland to join the Sisters of Loreto in Calcutta.
Sister Teresa began her life in Calcutta by teaching at St. Mary's School for girls at the Loreto community in Calcutta. She made her Final Profession of Vows in May 1937, after which she was called Mother Teresa. In 1944, she became the principal of the school where she taught.
Mother Teresa had spent more than 20 years at the Loreto school when she received permission in 1948 to start up her own religious community, the Missionaries of Charity. On August 17, 1948, she donned her characteristic white, blue-bordered sari for the first time and left the Loreto convent to help the poor.
Mother Teresa receives an award of honorary American citizenship from U.S. Ambassador to India
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By 1950, the Missionaries of Charity became an official branch of the Archdiocese of Calcutta. In 1957, her congregation began working with lepers and disaster victims, opening centres for blind, sick and orphaned children. In the 1960s, Mother Teresa began branching her order out into other areas of India. She founded the Missionaries of Charity Brothers in 1963 and by 1984 had founded contemplative branches of both the sisters and brothers. By this time she had begun opening houses of the Missionaries of Charity in most communist countries including the former Soviet Union, Albania and Cuba.
Mother Teresa first gained fame through BBC reporter Malcolm Muggeridge's 1969 documentary Something Beautiful for God. The film image and the book of the same title catapulted her onto the international stage where she developed a forum for poverty and anti-abortion activism. It was for her work with the sick, the dying and the forgotten people of India that she became an international icon.
Mother Teresa received her first honour in 1963 with the Indian Padmashri Award. Seventeen years later, she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
At the time of her death, Mother Teresa was still working with the Missionaries of Charity. Her Sisters numbered nearly 4,000 and could be found in 123 countries of the world. She blessed her successor, who had been elected by the Sisters of the Missionaries of Charity in March of 1997. She then made what would be her last trip abroad during which she met with Pope John Paul.
After returning to Calcutta, Mother Teresa spent her final weeks teaching the Missionaries of Charity and talking to the poor. On September 5, 1997, she died. The government of India gave her a state funeral and her body was buried in the Mother House of the Missionaries of Charity.
Less than two years after her death, Pope John Paul allowed the opening of her canonization cause. In the fall of 2002, reports of a miracle from Mother Teresa began to circulate within the Vatican. A non-Christian Indian woman, Monica Besra, was healed of a tumour in her abdomen. Supporters of Mother Teresa's canonization feel Besra was cured through the application of a locket containing Mother Teresa's picture. On December 20, 2002, the Pope accepted their claims, acknowledging Besra's healing as a miracle.
The beatification mass for Mother Teresa takes place on October 19, 2003.
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 QUICK FACTS: |
1910 On August 27, Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu is born in Skopje, Ottoman Empire.
1928 Bojaxhiu leaves Skopje for the Sisters of Loreto convent in Ireland.
1929 Sister Mary Teresa begins work in Darjeeling, India.
1931 Sister Teresa begins teaching at St. Mary's High School in Calcutta.
1937 Sister Teresa makes her final vows to the Church. She is then called Mother Teresa.
1946 Mother Teresa receives permission from the Sisters of Loreto to venture out to live and work among Calcutta's poor.
1950 Pope Paul VI officially acknowledges Mother Teresa's order, the Missionaries of Charity.
1963 India awards Mother Teresa her first of several honours to come – the Padmashri Award for services to the people of India.
1971 Mother Teresa receives the Pope John XXIII Peace Prize.
1972 For her promotion of international peace, she is awarded the Nehru Prize.
1979 Mother Teresa wins Nobel Peace Prize and the Balzan Prize for promoting peace and brotherhood among nations.
1980 India awards Mother Teresa the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian honour.
1982 She is given an honorary doctorate from Catholic University of Brussels.
1996 Mother Teresa becomes the 4th person to be made an honorary citizen of the United States.
1997 Mother Teresa dies on September 5, 1997, in Calcutta.
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