Mother Teresa: a biography

LOSS AND FAILINGS
The 1970s were an extraordinary period of growth for the Missionaries
of Charity and of growing recognition for Mother Teresa. Still, the decade
was not without its low points as Mother Teresa suffered both personal
losses and public failures. She may also have come to realize that not all
things were possible through faith and love alone.
The year 1970 began with a troubling letter from her sister Aga, who
was living with their mother in Tirana, Albania. Drana was in ill health
and her condition was worsening. On top of that, life under communist
rule was extremely difficult and the two were having a hard time making
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ends meet. For Mother Teresa, this was a bitter blow; her divine Provi-
dence, which had made possible the impossible, seemed strangely absent
now. But she took the news with a strong heart, yet sad that there was
nothing she could do to help her mother and sister when she had found
ways to help so many others around the world.
Yet, June 1970, Mother Teresa had a bittersweet homecoming. The
Red Cross extended an invitation to her to visit Yugoslavia. From there
she made the journey to Prizren, where her family originated, and then
traveled to Skopje, the city of her birth. Here she met with the local
bishop and visited the shrine at Letnice, where she had often visited to
pray and meditate as a young girl. She made it known that she hoped one
day to return to Skopje to open a Missionary of Charity home.
Later that year, Drana wrote to her son Lazar stating that her only wish
was to see him, his family, and her daughter Gonxha before she died. Both
Lazar and Mother Teresa worked hard to bring Aga and Drana to Italy for
a reunion. At one point, Mother Teresa, while on a visit to Rome, paid a
visit to the Albanian embassy seeking permission to bring her mother and
sister to Italy. Lazar, though limited in what he could do, tried working
with Catholic Relief Services to help relocate Aga and Drana in the event
that they would be allowed to leave. These attempts proved futile: the Al-
banian government refused to permit either Aga or Drana to leave the
country.
Mother Teresa then thought about traveling to Albania. But, to her
dismay, she learned that while she might be allowed to enter the country,
communist authorities could very well prevent her from leaving. Finally,
on July 12, 1972, Mother Teresa received word that her mother had died.
Not more than a year later, on August 25, 1973, more sad news came,
when she learned that her sister Aga had also died. Mother Teresa’s pain
and grief were not so much for herself, but for the mother and sister who
suffered.
The Missionaries of Charity also suffered severe setbacks during the
1970s. In 1971, after much fanfare, the order opened a house in Belfast,
Northern Ireland, in the Catholic ghetto of Ballymurphy. Belfast was, at
the time, a city under siege, as Catholic and Protestant factions engaged
in almost daily violence. Mother Teresa sent four sisters who came with a
violin and two blankets each. The house where they were to live had been
previously occupied by a priest who had been shot just as he had finished
administering last rites to a wounded man. The house was completely
empty and had been the target of vandals. Undaunted, the sisters began
working with a small group of Anglican nuns in the hope of helping to
end strife in the city.
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After only 18 months in Belfast, the sisters left, stating that they were
unwanted and saw no need to risk further danger to themselves. Mother
Teresa preferred to see their leaving, however, not as a failure, but as a call,
for the sisters were obviously needed somewhere else. She sent them to
Ethiopia where they were to help victims of a terrible drought that rav-
aged the country.
During the 1980s, the Missionaries of Charity experienced more bad
luck, when in March 1980 someone set a fire at a home for destitute
women run by the order in Kilburn, London. Ten residents of the shelter
and one volunteer died in the blaze. The arsonist was never found. In
1986, two sisters were drowned in Dehra Dun, India, when a wooden
bridge collapsed during a heavy rain, sending their ambulance into the
river below. Although Mother Teresa offered prayers for the dead, no
doubt both incidents weighed heavily upon her.
Even more painful for Mother Teresa was the number of professed sis-
ters choosing to leave the Missionaries of Charity. Of the original 12
women who became the order’s first nuns, two eventually left, as well as a
small number of others over the years. Their reasons for leaving were
many: some chose to serve God in another way, others wished to leave be-
cause of ill health. Some even fell in love and wished to marry and raise
families. Mother Teresa did not resent the women’s choices; in fact she
often thanked them for their time and effort in their service to the order.
Still, it clearly saddened her to lose members.
Despite these setbacks, the Missionaries of Charity continued to grow.
By 1979, there were 158 foundations established throughout the world.
There were 1,187 professed sisters, 411 novices, and 120 postulants. What
was perhaps most amazing about the continued growth of the order was
that it came at a time when religious vocations for the Church were gen-
erally on the decline. It appeared that the total commitment to a life of
poverty and the complete surrender of the self in the service of God held
tremendous appeal for women everywhere. For Mother Teresa, the con-
tinued arrival of newcomers ready to work for the poor was heartwarming.
Each week it seemed a new group left Motherhouse bound for some desti-
nation where they were needed. As Mother Teresa once remarked, “If
there are poor on the moon, we shall go there too.”
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