Totus Tuus - Totus 2us

_{Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu born on 26 August 1910 in Albania
Joined Sisters of Loreto in 1928
Founded the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta in 1950
Died on 5 September 1997. Beatified by John Paul II on 19 October 2003
Feast Day - 5th September}

_{“By blood, I am Albanian. By citizenship, an Indian. By faith, I am a Catholic nun. As to my calling, I belong to the world. As to my heart, I belong entirely to the Heart of Jesus.”}

_{"I believe that our mother the Church has elevated women to a great honour in the presence of God by proclaiming Mary the Mother of the Church. God so loved the world that He gave His Son. This was the first Eucharist: the gift of his Son, when He gave Him to Our Lady, establishing in her the first altar." - Mother Teresa in her address on Women & the Eucharist (1976)}

3 2us by Monsignor Leo Maasburg (with 2 quotes by Mother Teresa)       ♦ 

Mother Teresa - “The young people, especially in their application, write: ‘I want a life of poverty, prayer and sacrifice that will lead me to a service of the poor. .. The lonely, the unwanted, the unloved – we try to bring Jesus to them, by involving them in the service of the poor, by our presence among them, they must be able to look up and see Jesus in us. And also I believe in helping them to come in touch with the poor, because the poor give us much more than we give to the poor.”

Fr Leo: "John Paul II said ‘In Mother Teresa we meet one of the most important personalities in history’ .. Hers is the sanctity which shows the whole mystery of the redemption, sin and redemption. And I believe that we can pray to and venerate Mother Teresa precisely for this, to help us to collaborate in the redemption of the world. On her feast day this is the biggest wish I want to express. When we celebrate the memory of her death on 5th September, we can even liturgically invoke that favour from her: to be able to collaborate for the redemption of the world." (Recorded on 26th August 2010, the centenary of Mother Teresa's birth)

Father Tom's something about Mary:  "One day Mother Teresa was asked by a bishop the secret of her success .. How she'd managed to touch the hearts of so many people. In reply she told a story - she said that when she was young she was walking with her mother to a neighbouring village, and it was somewhere she had never been to before. At one point in the journey her mother stopped and said to her 'Do you know where we're going?' and she replied 'No, this is the first time I'm going.' And her mother said 'You're right, you don't know where we're going but you're not frightened because I'm here and I'm holding your hand and I will lead you to the place we're going.' And her mother said her 'In the same way, as you're going through life, hold onto the hand of Mary and Mary will lead you to the heart of her son, Jesus.' And Mother Teresa said that was really the secret of her apostolate, that each day she thought about Mary and she felt herself holding Mary's hands and Mary leading her ever more deeply to the heart of Jesus. I found that such a powerful story, I think of it every time I pray the rosary, because when I pick up my rosary I see it as really holding Mary's hands .. and being taken into the heart of Jesus."      ♦

Through the Cross to Light - the spiritual experience of Blessed Mother Teresa

by Father Michael Dunne       ♦

_{"What's all this about? Why I think it's so important is the theology of the resurrection. This is what Teresa teaches us about. As St Paul to the Philippians says: "All I want is to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and to share his sufferings by conforming myself to the pattern of his death." Teresa teaches us: 'If ever I become a saint, I will surely be one of darkness. I will continually be absent from heaven to light the light of those in darkness on earth." The paradox of darkness is that it is the gateway to light, through the cross to light - per crucem ad lucem. The key to holiness in every Catholic's life - not just in the lives of the great saints, every one of us is called to sanctity - must be this interiorisation of the Passion; of what St Paul of the Cross calls 'participation in the Passion.' Because if we can interiorise the Passion of Jesus Christ, live it in our own suffering, then we are open boundlessly to all that the Passion is for the redemption of the world. It is the means of our own purification, living our suffering, but even when we have done that, it is the means of reparation also, that we share Christ's redemptive role in the world, which is the dignity conferred upon us in our baptism.  Mother Teresa says to the sisters going to daily Mass: 'Each sister is to do the work of the priest where the priest cannot go, and do what he cannot do. She must be imbibed by the spirit of Holy Mass, which is one of total surrender and offering. For this reason, Holy Mass must become the daily meeting place where God and his creature offer each other for each other and the world." What a staggering theology of the Mass - that you go to Mass offering yourself to God for the salvation of the world and, yes, God offers himself to you for the salvation of the world, and in that intimacy and communion we have joined the Cross and the Resurrection. Because, when St Paul tells the Galations: "I am crucified with Christ and yet I am alive. Yet it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me', it looks as if he is talking about the crucifixion, about darkness; but he's not talking about the crucifixion. He never knew Jesus of Nazareth on earth; he has only known the Risen One and what he is talking about there is the power of the resurrection, the power of 'per crucem ad lucem.' The last words to Mother Teresa: "The joy of loving Jesus comes from the joy of sharing his sufferings so do not allow yourselves to be troubled or distressed but believe in the joy of the resurrection. In all of our lives, as in the life of Jesus, the resurrection has to come, the joy of Easter has to dawn." So in the very darkness she lived, she was a witness to the resurrection and all of us are called and have that same gift offered to us in the daily suffering that we have in our lives."}

_{(full talk - 30 mins. Apologies for sound quality - there was a torrential downpour going on outside during the talk!)}

John Paul II's Homily at the Beatification Mass

<sub>World Mission Sunday, 19th October 2003
- in English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese & Spanish</sub>

1. "Whoever would be first among you must be slave of all" (Mk10: 44). Jesus' words to his disciples that have just rung out in this Square show us the way to evangelical "greatness". It is the way walked by Christ himself that took him to the Cross: a journey of love and service that overturns all human logic. To be the servant of all!

Mother Teresa of Calcutta, Foundress of the Missionaries of Charity whom today I have the joy of adding to the Roll of the Blesseds, allowed this logic to guide her. I am personally grateful to this courageous woman whom I have always felt beside me. Mother Teresa, an icon of the Good Samaritan, went everywhere to serve Christ in the poorest of the poor. Not even conflict and war could stand in her way.

Every now and then she would come and tell me about her experiences in her service to the Gospel values. I remember, for example, her pro-life and anti-abortion interventions, even when she was awarded the Nobel Prize for peace (Oslo, 10 December 1979). She often used to say: "If you hear of some woman who does not want to keep her child and wants to have an abortion, try to persuade her to bring him to me. I will love that child, seeing in him the sign of God's love."

2. Is it not significant that her beatification is taking place on the very day on which the Church celebrates World Mission Sunday? With the witness of her life, Mother Teresa reminds everyone that the evangelizing mission of the Church passes through charity, nourished by prayer and listening to God's word. Emblematic of this missionary style is the image that shows the new Blessed clasping a child's hand in one hand while moving her Rosary beads with the other.

Contemplation and action, evangelization and human promotion: Mother Teresa proclaimed the Gospel living her life as a total gift to the poor but, at the same time, steeped in prayer.

3. Whoever wants to be great among you must be your servant" (Mk 10: 43). With particular emotion we remember today Mother Teresa, a great servant of the poor, of the Church and of the whole world. Her life is a testimony to the dignity and the privilege of humble service. She had chosen to be not just the least but to be the servant of the least. As a real mother to the poor, she bent down to those suffering various forms of poverty. Her greatness lies in her ability to give without counting the cost, to give "until it hurts". Her life was a radical living and a bold proclamation of the Gospel.

The cry of Jesus on the Cross, "I thirst" (Jn 19: 28), expressing the depth of God's longing for man, penetrated Mother Teresa's soul and found fertile soil in her heart. Satiating Jesus' thirst for love and for souls in union with Mary, the Mother of Jesus, had become the sole aim of Mother Teresa's existence and the inner force that drew her out of herself and made her "run in haste" across the globe to labour for the salvation and the sanctification of the poorest of the poor.

4. "As you did to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me" (Mt 25: 40). This Gospel passage, so crucial in understanding Mother Teresa's service to the poor, was the basis of her faith-filled conviction that in touching the broken bodies of the poor she was touching the body of Christ. It was to Jesus himself, hidden under the distressing disguise of the poorest of the poor, that her service was directed. Mother Teresa highlights the deepest meaning of service - an act of love done to the hungry, thirsty, strangers, naked, sick, prisoners is done to Jesus himself.

Recognizing him, she ministered to him with wholehearted devotion, expressing the delicacy of her spousal love. Thus, in total gift of herself to God and neighbour, Mother Teresa found her greatest fulfilment and lived the noblest qualities of her femininity. She wanted to be a sign of "God's love, God's presence and God's compassion", and so remind all of the value and dignity of each of God's children, "created to love and be loved". Thus was Mother Teresa "bringing souls to God and God to souls" and satiating Christ's thirst, especially for those most in need, those whose vision of God had been dimmed by suffering and pain.

5. "The Son of man also came... to give his life as a ransom for many" (Mk 10: 45). Mother Teresa shared in the Passion of the crucified Christ in a special way during long years of "inner darkness". For her that was a test, at times an agonizing one, which she accepted as a rare "gift and privilege".

In the darkest hours she clung even more tenaciously to prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. This harsh spiritual trial led her to identify herself more and more closely with those whom she served each day, feeling their pain and, at times, even their rejection. She was fond of repeating that the greatest poverty is to be unwanted, to have no one to take care of you.

6. "Lord, let your mercy be on us, as we place our trust in you". How often, like the Psalmist, did Mother Teresa call on her Lord in times of inner desolation: "In you, in you I hope, my God!"

Let us praise the Lord for this diminutive woman in love with God, a humble Gospel messenger and a tireless benefactor of humanity. In her we honour one of the most important figures of our time. Let us welcome her message and follow her example.

Virgin Mary, Queen of all the Saints, help us to be gentle and humble of heart like this fearless messenger of Love. Help us to serve every person we meet with joy and a smile. Help us to be missionaries of Christ, our peace and our hope. Amen!

Come Be My Light

This book collates together the letters Mother Teresa wrote to her spiritual advisors over decades, almost all of which had never been made public before (Mother Teresa had asked for her letters to be destroyed!). They shed light on Mother Teresa's interior life in a way that reveals the depth and intensity of her holiness. 

For more about Mother Teresa, visit the website for the Mother Teresa of Calcutta Center.