Mother Teresa

I sometimes hear this in sermons. I'd like to think that it's true:

"A newspaper writer was visiting Mother Teresa in a Calcutta Hospital several years ago and found her comforting a dying A.I.D.S. patient as she held him in her arms. The reporter said "Mother, I wouldn't do what your'e doing for a million dollars". Mother replied, "I wouldn't do it for a million dollars either, but I do do it for love."

Has anyone else heard this?
 
I haven't heard it, but she’s done more amazing things. She gave her life to God and went to one of the most poorest part of the world Calcutta in India to help the sick and poor. Actually, she has been responsible for miracles too.
 
Postmaster said:
I haven't heard it, but she’s done more amazing things. She gave her life to God and went to one of the most poorest part of the world Calcutta in India to help the sick and poor. Actually, she has been responsible for miracles too.
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She was Human, and all the best that means. We should all consider that fact.
 
She was human but she was extraordinary and we can't all expect to live up her standards. She is a great role model, best of all she represents the Christian religion very well.
 
Do not think that love, in order to be genuine, has to be extraordinary. What we need is to love without getting tired.

--Mother Teresa
 
Postmaster said:
She was human but she was extraordinary and we can't all expect to live up her standards. She is a great role model, best of all she represents the Christian religion very well.
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My point my friend is that she was HUMAN, and the best that that entails. She was an ordinary person who chose to deal in extraordinary means. In otherwords as close to perfect as a Human can get, she was approaching...
 
I find the story about the journalist saying he wouldn't hold a dying AIDS patient for a million dollars quite upsetting--just the fact that someone would be so callous and also so vocal about it. Perhaps it was around the time when people weren't sure how AIDS was transmitted.

Anyhow, Mother Teresa is quite inspring. Here are some quotes that I've seen attributed to her in my time:
  • "If you judge people, you have no time to love them."
  • "It's not how much we give but how much love we put into giving."
  • "We cannot all do great things, but we can do small things with great love."
  • "Intense love does not measure; it just gives."
  • I particularly like this one: "Unless a life is lived for others, it is not worthwhile."
  • "If you can't feed a hundred people, then just feed one."
  • "One must have really suffered oneself to help others." Another great one.
  • "The miracle is not that we do this work, but are happy to do it."
  • "I never look at the masses as my responsibility; I look at the individual. I can only love one person at a time - just one, one, one. So you begin. I began - I picked up one person. Maybe if I didn't pick up that one person, I wouldn't have picked up forty-two thousand....The same thing goes for you, the same thing in your family, the same thing in your church, your community. Just begin - one, one, one."
  • "Every time you smile at someone, it is an action of love, a gift to that person, a beautiful thing."
  • "I have found the paradox that if I love until it hurts, then there is no hurt, but only more love."
  • "I believe in person to person. Every person is Christ for me, and since there is only one Jesus, that person is the only person in the world at that moment." What a beautiful expression of devotion to the divinity inherent in every person.
In Mother Teresa, we have a normal person who becomes incredible through her devotion to service and love. By approaching people with sincerity, humility, and love, she created powerful changes in peoples' lives--not simply the people who were directly affected by her service, but also all of us who are inspired by her selfless service and devotion.
 
I like this quote attributed to Mother Teresa:
~Mother Teresa~


People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered.
Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives.
Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies.
Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you.
Be honest and frank anyway.

What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight.
Build anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous.
Be happy anyway.

The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow.
Do good anyway.

Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough.
Give the world the best you've got anyway.

You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God.
It was never between you and them anyway.
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I am loving these quotes. To me, Mother Teresa epitomizes the true Christian spirit. She went way beyond expectations of the norm. We need more Mother Teresas in the world today.
 
I read news reports off the net about her months ago.. One was she was suffering from insomnia in her later days and that priests were performing exorcisms on her to rid of evil influence.

And like I mentioned before news reports of miracle healings, one was of an Indian girl who held her picture that was ill and got cured. Which I must say is not unusual of a saint and they even carry on helping people in the afterlife. Since I have read many biographies of Greek Orthodox saints, they seem to follow similar patterns on how they live there life and there ethics. Christian saint is the most difficult form of virtue to acquire known ;) But that is from my perspective of course. To them it's there mission, duty, love and happiness etc etc... It all has to do with Christian theology.
 
"We all long for heaven where God is, but we have it in our power to be in heaven with him at this very moment. But being happy with him now means:

Loving as he loves,
Helping as he helps,
Giving as he gives,
Serving as he serves,
Rescuing as he rescues,
Being with him twenty-four hours,
Touching him in his distressing disguise."

Mother Teresa

I have found her incredibly inspiring throughout my life. She was (in truth, is) a beautiful person.

And a humble one. Reportedly, a man that was traveling next to her on an airplane once remarked that she was a very good person. She grabbed a napkin and a pen, and made a line, with Satan on one end and God on the other. She made a little mark close to Satan's end. She told him something to the effect of... (trying to remember the story) "We are all here. There is no better or worse of us. We are saved by God's grace, and what good we do is done through Him."

What a spokesperson for Christianity and the Gospel message. If there are any miracles attributed to Mother Teresa, I personally think the greatest miracle is simply that someone can become that selfless, that loving, and that compassionate towards the "least of these my brethren." The transformation of the human soul when it is given over to Christ is the greatest miracle.
 
What a spokesperson for Christianity and the Gospel message. If there are any miracles attributed to Mother Teresa, I personally think the greatest miracle is simply that someone can become that selfless, that loving, and that compassionate towards the "least of these my brethren." The transformation of the human soul when it is given over to Christ is the greatest miracle.
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Im not going to sit and say I agree. I'll just thank you for pointing that out as it's helpful to me.
 
Postmaster said:
Im not going to sit and say I agree. I'll just thank you for pointing that out as it's helpful to me.
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She performed no outright miracles persee (and I suspect she would be the first to vote against her sainthood), however her life itself and long winded dedication to those in need, could be considered one great big super miracle.

St. Francis could communicate with the animals (apparently quite well), and Mother Theresa could communicate with the human psyche (apparently quite well). She understood the human condition...not too many can say the same.
 
I find that interesting about St. Francis! She was a very modest lady she is the opposite of a megalomaniac. Quahom1, although her work was very miraculous without the supernatural activity, she sure did through god create super natural miracles. I do not even need it to be told to me. Her ethics and life path was very similar to other Greek Orthodox saints I have studied and they did miracles. It’s a verification of her saint hood and I’m sure more will be exposed. You can already do a Google search and find stories. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2290349.stm
 
Postmaster said:
I find that interesting about St. Francis! She was a very modest lady she is the opposite of a megalomaniac. Quahom1, although her work was very miraculous without the supernatural activity, she sure did through god create super natural miracles. I do not even need it to be told to me. Her ethics and life path was very similar to other Greek Orthodox saints I have studied and they did miracles. It’s a verification of her saint hood and I’m sure more will be exposed. You can already do a Google search and find stories. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2290349.stmhttp://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2290349.stmhttp://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2290349.stm
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Oh, I know, and agree Postmaster. I was simply pointing out that she would be chagrinned to be considered a saint. I can hear her now...

"Do good for others, and they'll dig up your bones, rip your burial cloths and sell all as souveniers...
do good for others, anyway." :rolleyes:
 
I do see where you coming from your correct. I don't think there is anything wrong with pointing these things out. I’m sure also in the Catholic faith Icon Worship is part of the faith and an understanding of a saints life, including the miracles they performed, in fact I know of Greek Orthodox saints that ask for faith in them and there miracles to people in dreams in order to get a saints help. There are many people out there that refuse to believe them of course. Profiteering out of saints like using them as tourist attractions and elaborating there miracles is of course negative and of what I see you pointing at. Many times, saint in the Greek Orthdox tradition, ask for something in return for a miracle, usually a donation to the church, giving up wealth, helping others, founding a church in there name. Once my Great grandfather made a collection for the church off the locals and was suppose to drop the money off at the church that day but got busy and had forgot to do so. That night he fell a sleep, either angels or saints visited him telling him he forgot to hand in the donations. That story was told to me by my Grandmother.
 
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