Time:
What did you do this morning? |
Mother
Teresa: Pray. |
Time:
When did you start? |
Mother
Teresa: Half-past four |
Time:
And after prayer |
Mother
Teresa: We try to pray through our work by doing it with Jesus, for
Jesus, to Jesus. That helps us to put our whole heart and soul into
doing it. The dying, the cripple, the mental, the unwanted, the unloved
they are Jesus in disguise. |
Time:
People know you as a sort of religious social worker. Do they understand
the spiritual basis of your work? |
Mother
Teresa: I don't know. But I give them a chance to come and touch the
poor. Everybody has to experience that. So many young people give up
everything to do just that. This is something so completely unbelievable
in the world, no? And yet it is wonderful. Our volunteers go back
different people. |
Time:
Does the fact that you are a woman make your message more understandable? |
Mother
Teresa: I never think like that. |
Time:
But don't you think the world responds better to a mother? |
Mother
Teresa: People are responding not because of me, but because of what
we're doing. Before, people were speaking much about the poor, but now
more and more people are speaking to the poor. That's the great
difference. The work has created this. The presence of the poor is known
now, especially the poorest of the poor, the unwanted, the loved, the
uncared-for. Before, nobody bothered about the people in the street. We
have picked up from the streets of Calcutta 54,000 people, and 23,000
something have died in that one room [at Kalighat].
[Seitenanfang] |
Time:
Why have you been so successful? |
Mother
Teresa: Jesus made Himself the bread of life to give us life. That's
where we begin the day, with Mass. And we end the day with Adoration of
the Blessed Sacrament. I don't think that I could do this work for even
one week if I didn't have four hours of prayer every day. |
Time:
Humble as you are, it must be an extraordinary thing to be a vehicle of
God's grace in the world. |
Mother
Teresa: But it is His work. I think God wants to show His greatness
by using nothingness. |
Time:
You are nothingness? |
Mother
Teresa: I'm very sure of that. |
Time:
You feel you have no special qualities? |
Mother
Teresa: I don't think so. I don't claim anything of the work. It's
His work. I'm like a little pencil in His hand. That's all. He does the
thinking. He does the writing. The pencil has nothing to do it. The
pencil has only to be allowed to be used. In human terms, the success of
our work should not have happened, no? That is a sign that it's His work,
and that He is using others as instruments - all our Sisters. None of us
could produce this. Yet see what He has done. |
Time:
What is God's greatest gift to you? |
Mother
Teresa: The poor people. |
Time:
How are they a gift? |
Mother
Teresa: I have an opportunity to be with Jesus 24 hours a day. |
Time:
Here in Calcutta, have you created a real change? |
Mother
Teresa: I think so. People are aware of the presence and also many,
many, many Hindu people share with us. They come and feed the people and
they serve the people. Now we never see a person lying there in the
street dying. It has created a worldwide awareness of the poor.
[Seitenanfang] |
Time:
Beyond showing the poor to the world, have you conveyed any message
about how to work with the poor? |
Mother
Teresa: You must make them feel loved and wanted. They are Jesus for
me. I believe in that much more than doing big things for them. |
Time:
What's your greatest hope here in India? |
Mother
Teresa: To give Jesus to all. |
Time:
But you do not evangelize in the conventional sense of the term. |
Mother
Teresa: I'm evangelizing by my works of love. |
Time:
Is that the best way? |
Mother
Teresa: For us, yes. For somebody else, something else. I'm
evangelizing the way God wants me to. Jesus said go and preach to all
the nations. We are now in so many nations preaching the Gospel by our
works of love. "By the love that you have for one another will they
know you are my disciples." That's the preaching that we are doing,
and I think that is more real. |
Time:
Friends of yours say that you are disappointed that your work has not
brought more conversions in this great Hindu nation. |
Mother
Teresa: Missionaries don't think of that. They only want to proclaim
the Word of God. Numbers have nothing to do with it. But the people are
putting prayer into action by coming and serving the people. Continually
people are coming to feed and serve, so many, you go and see. Everywhere
people are helping. We don't know the future. But the door is already
open to Christ. There may not be a big conversion like that, but we
don't know what is happening in the soul. |
Time:
What do you think of Hinduism? |
Mother
Teresa: I love all religions, but I am in love with my own. No
discussion. That's what we have to prove to them. Seeing what I do, they
realize that I am in love with Jesus.
[Seitenanfang] |
Time:
And they should love Jesus too? |
Mother
Teresa: Naturally, if they want peace, if they want joy, let them
find Jesus. If people become better Hindus, better Moslems, better
Buddhists by our acts of love, then there is something else growing
there. They come closer and closer to God. When they come closer, they
have to choose. |
Time:
You and John Paul II, among other Church leaders, have spoken out
against certain lifestyles in the West, against materialism and abortion.
How alarmed are you? |
Mother
Teresa: I always say one thing: If a mother can kill her own child,
then what is left of the West to be destroyed? It is difficult to
explain , but it is just that. |
Time:
When you spoke at Harvard University a few years ago, you said abortion
was a great evil and people booed. What did you think when people booed
you? |
Mother
Teresa: I offered it to our Lord. It's all for Him, no? I let Him
say what He wants. |
Time:
But these people who booed you would say that they also only want the
best for women? |
Mother
Teresa: That may be. But we must tell the truth. |
Time:
And that is? |
Mother
Teresa: We have no right to kill. Thou shalt not kill, a commandment
of God. And still should we kill the helpless one, the little one? You
see we get so excited because people are throwing bombs and so many are
being killed. For the grown ups, there is so much excitement in the
world. But that little one in the womb, not even a sound? He cannot even
escape. That child is the poorest of the poor.
[Seitenanfang] |
Time:
Is materialism in the West an equally serious problem? |
Mother
Teresa: I don't know. I have so many things to think about. I pray
lots about that, but I am not occupied by that. Take our congregation
for example, we have very little, so we have nothing to be preoccupied
with. The more you have, the more you are occupied, the less you give.
But the less you have the more free you are. Poverty for us is a freedom.
It is not a mortification, a penance. It is joyful freedom. There is no
television here, no this, no that. This is the only fan in the whole
house. It doesn't matter how hot it is, and it is for the guests. But we
are perfectly happy. |
Time:
How do you find rich people then? |
Mother
Teresa: I find the rich much poorer. Sometimes they are more lonely
inside. They are never satisfied. They always need something more. I
don't say all of them are like that. Everybody is not the same. I find
that poverty hard to remove. The hunger for love is much more difficult
to remove than the hunger for bread. |
Time:
What is the saddest place you've ever visited? |
Mother
Teresa: I don't know. I can't remember. It's a sad thing to see
people suffer., especially the broken family, unloved, uncared for. It's
a big sadness; it's always the children who suffer most when there is no
love in the family. That's a terrible suffering. Very difficult because
you can do nothing. That is the great poverty. You feel helpless. But if
you pick up a person dying of hunger, you give him food and it is
finished. |
Time:
Why has your order grown so quickly? |
Mother
Teresa: When I ask young people why they want to join us, they say
they want the life of prayer, the life of poverty and the life of
service to the poorest of the poor. One very rich girl wrote to me and
said for a very long time she had been longing to become a nun. When she
met us, she said I won't have to give up anything even if I give up
everything. You see, that is the mentality of the young today. We have
many vocations.
[Seitenanfang] |
Time:
There's been some criticism of the very sever regimen under which you
and your Sisters live. |
Mother
Teresa: We chose that. That is the difference between us and the
poor. Because what will bring us closer to our poor people? How can we
be truthful to them if we lead a different life? If we have everything
possible that money can give, that the world can give, then what is our
connection to the poor? What language will I speak to them? Now if the
people tell me it is so hot, I can say you come and see my room. |
Time:
Just as hot? |
Mother
Teresa: Much hotter even, because there is a kitchen underneath. A
man came and stayed here as a cook at the children's home. He was rich
before and became very poor. Lost everything. He came and said, "Mother
Teresa, I cannot eat that food." I said, "I am eating it every
day." He looked at me and said, "You eat it too? All right, I
will eat it also." And he left perfectly happy. Now if I could not
tell him the truth, that man would have remained bitter. He would never
have accepted his poverty. He would never have accepted to have that
food when he was used to other kinds of food. That helped him to forgive,
to forget. |
Time:
What's the most joyful place that you have ever visited? |
Mother
Teresa: Kalighat. When the people die in peace, in the love of God,
it is a wonderful thing. To see our poor people happy together with
their families, these are beautiful things. The real poor know what is
joy. |
Time:
There are people who would say that it's an illusion to think of the
poor as joyous, that they must be given housing, raised up. |
Mother
Teresa: The material is not the only thing that gives joy. Something
greater than that, the deep sense of peace in the heart. They are
content. That is the great difference between rich and poor. |
Time:
But what about those people who are oppressed? Who are taken advantage
of? |
Mother
Teresa: There will always be people like that. That is why we must
come and share the joy of loving with them.
[Seitenanfang] |
Time:
Should the Church's role be just to make the poor as joyous in Christ as
they can be made? |
Mother
Teresa: You and I, we are the Church, no? We have to share with our
people. Suffering today is because people are hoarding, not giving, not
sharing. Jesus made it very clear. Whatever you do to the least of my
brethren, you do it to me. Give a glass of water, you give it to me.
Receive a little child, you receive me. Clear. |
Time:
If you speak to a political leader who could do more for his people, do
you tell him that he must do better? |
Mother
Teresa: I don't say it like that. I say share the joy of loving with
your people. Because a politician maybe cannot do the feeding as I do.
But he should be clear in his mind to give proper rules and proper
regulations to help his people. |
Time:
It is my job to keep politicians honest, and your job to share joy with
the poor. |
Mother
Teresa: Exactly. And it is to be for the good of the people and the
glory of God. This will be really fruitful. Like a man says to me that
you are spoiling the people by giving them fish to eat. You have to give
them a rod to catch the fish. And I said my people cannot even stand,
still less hold a rod. But I will give them the fish to eat, and when
they are strong enough, I will hand them over to you. And you give them
the rod to catch the fish. That is a beautiful combination, no? |
Time:
Feminist Catholic nuns sometimes say that you should pour your energy
into getting the Vatican to ordain women. |
Mother
Teresa: That does not touch me. |
Time:
What do you think of the feminist movement among nuns in the West? |
Mother
Teresa: I think we should be more busy with our Lord than with all
that, more busy with Jesus and proclaiming His Word. What a woman can
give, no man can give. That is why God has created them separately. Nuns,
women, any woman. Woman is created to be the heart of the family, the
heart of love. If we miss that, we miss everything. They give that love
in the family or they give it in service, that is what their creation is
for.
[Seitenanfang] |
Time:
The world wants to know more about you. |
Mother
Teresa: No, no. Let them come to know the poor. I want them to love
the poor. I want them to try to find the poor in their own families
first, to bring peace and joy and love in the family first. |
Time:
Malcolm Muggeridge once said that if you had not become a Sister and not
found Christ's love, you would be a very hard woman. Do you think that
is true? |
Mother
Teresa: I don't know. I have no time to think about these things. |
Time:
People who work with you say that you are unstoppable. You always get
what you want. |
Mother
Teresa: That's right. All for Jesus. |
Time:
And if they have a problem with that? |
Mother
Teresa: For example, I went to a person recently who would not give
me what I needed. I said God bless you, and I went on. He called me back
and said what would you say if I give you that thing. I said I will give
you a "God bless you" and a big smile. That is all. So he said
then come, I will give it to you. We must live the simplicity of the
Gospel. |
Time:
You once met Haile Mariam Mengistu, the much feared communist leader of
Ethiopia and an avowed atheist. You asked him if he said his prayers.
Why did you risk that? |
Mother
Teresa: He is one more child of God. When I went to China, one of
the top officials asked me, "What is a communist to you?" I
said, "A child of God." Then the next morning the newspapers
reported that Mother Teresa said communists are children of God. I was
happy because after a long, long time the name God was printed in the
papers in China. Beautiful. |
Time:
Are you ever been afraid? |
Mother
Teresa: No.1 am only afraid of offending God. We are all human
beings, that is our weakness, no? The devil would do anything to destroy
us, to take us away from Jesus.
[Seitenanfang] |
Time:
Where do you see the devil at work? |
Mother
Teresa: Everywhere. When a person is longing to come closer to God
he puts temptation in the way to destroy the desire. Sin comes
everywhere, in the best of places. |
Time:
What is your greatest fear? |
Mother
Teresa: I have Jesus, I have no fear. |
Time:
What is your greatest disappointment? |
Mother
Teresa: I do the will of God, no? In doing the will of God there is
no disappointment. |
Time:
Do your work and spiritual life become easier with time? |
Mother
Teresa: Yes, the closer we come to Jesus, the more we become the
work. Because you know to whom you are doing it, with whom you are doing
it and for whom you are doing it. That is very clear. That is why we
need a clean heart to see God. |
Time:
What are your plans for the future? |
Mother
Teresa: I just take one day. Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not
come. We have only today to love Jesus. |
Time:
And the future of the order? |
Mother
Teresa: It is His concern. |