Ibrahim Husain

“Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person. ” -Mother Teresa

It is amazing how quickly the right person can gain a prominent position in our hearts.  Yesterday I barely knew Mother Teresa, but today she’s a new hero of mine.  And it all started with a 2 page biography from The Compact Classics.

Mother Teresa never wrote an autobiography.  She didn’t need to.  Her work spoke more about her than any words ever could.  She wasn’t a saint, wasn’t a politian, nor did she ever hold any position of high leadership.  She wasn’t a billionaire, a millionaire, she wasn’t even a hundredaire (if there ever was such a thing).  Yet Mother Teresa was one of the greatest philanthropic humanitarian leaders of all time.

Mother Teresa dedicated her life to the aid of others, neglected material wealth, and preached love, happiness, and a path to God.  She dedicated more to the cause of philanthropy than most in history, and her cause is an inspiration to us all.

Mother Teresa, born Agnes Gonxha, taught at St. Mary’s High School, overlooking the Calcutta slums.  The teachers and students did much to help many diseased and destitute, who lived in the neighborhoods surrounding the school. But one day she received “a call,”

“…the inner command to renounce Loreta, where I was very happy, and to go to serve the poor in the streets. [It was as though God] wanted me to be poor with the poor… I had the blessing of obedience.“

She started a new order, the “Missionaries of Charity,” which quickly grew in numbers.  Mother Teresa taught her followers to pray, humbly accept praise, and to smile as they served (for smiling helps one become holy).  She sent her followers around the world, working with lepers, and in the slums.

“Our sisters [and brothers], walk and walk until their legs ache, to see which is the worst place, where the need is the greatest…“

Mother Teresa’s work was grand.  It was more than just providing basic necessaties to those in need.

“Without our suffering, our work would just be social work: very good and helpful, but it would not be the work of Jesus Christ, not part of the redemption… Bringing God into… Lives.”

Even whilst dealing with death, Mother Teresa kept her spirit and humor.  Once while very ill with fever, in a delirium, she went before Saint Peter, who ordered her to “Go back, there are no slums in Heaven!” She relates:

“So I got very angry with him and I said, Very well… I will fill heaven with slum people and you will have slums then!”

In Calcutta, Mother Teresa opened a leper rehabilitation center, constructed homes and hospitals for 55,000 lepers, built a childs home for children of lepes could be taken for adoption.  Mother Teresa said:

“It hurt them to give up the child, but because they loved the child more than they loved themselves, they gave it up.“

Two kinds of poverty exist, as Mother Teresa explains: the lack of material things, and the much deeper hunger for God, love and companionship. People everywhere are hungry for love.

“Each time I go to Europe and America… I am struck by the unhappiness of so many people living in those rich countries: so many broken homes; children not looked after by their parent… They have material wealth; they lack spiritual values.“

An othodox Catholic, Mother Teresa was deeply in favor of each child being born.

“We are fighting abortion by adoption… I feel that hte poorest contry is the country that has to kill the unborn child to be able to have extra things and extra pleasures. They are afraid to have to feed one more child!“

“The miracle is not that we do this work, but that we are happy to do it. God has not called me to be successful, he has called me to be faithful. What we do is nothing but one drop in the ocean.  But if we didn’t do it, the ocean would be one drop less.“

To all, Mother teresa recommended kindness, charity, humility, activity, joy, and the glory of God. And how do we find these?

“We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence.“

Mother Teresa didnt need wealth.  She didnt require anything to fulfill her purpose.  She had a clear goal in her mind, and the motivation to do her work.  And that she did.  If there is anything we can take from Mother Teresa’s example, it is that you don’t have to wait till you are successful to help others.

Charity costs little more than a smile, and it’s reward is safe with God.  So spread charity as you would spread the seeds of a garden, and as they grow, your garden will be paradise. -Ibrahim Husain