Lectio et Oratio

Episode 129 -- Come Be My Light ch 12.2 -- Remember my Face before Jesus

How did Mother react when she met a new person?

It depends. Mother lived in the presence of God. She could assess a situation very quickly. She could form a judgment of a person’s good qualities with little time spent. With the help of the Holy Spirit, she tried to treat each person as God wanted her to do so.

Episode 128 -- Come Be My Light ch 12.1 -- God Uses Nothingness to Show His Greatness

What was her prayer like?

Uncompromising. Full of intercession. Mother Teresa was incredibly faithful to her times of prayer, especially her holy hour. She could be flexible with the time and place. But she knew He wanted her there. And so she answered His call. Her prayer was sometimes simply the bringing before Him of the faces she had met on the streets.

 

Episode 127 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.20 -- She Had Found Her Way

Episode 126 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.19 -- Be Happy for We Share the Passion of Christ

How did Mother Teresa described the year 1967?

She said it was a “hard and sad time of fight for the faith.” Even though the Second Vatican Council (1962-5) was meant to enliven the faith of the whole Church and urge the Church on in her missionary work, the years after the Council, like the years after many Councils, were times of great controversy. Mother saw these years as one of purification. She counselled clinging to the living Christ. But where? In the Eucharist.

Episode 125 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.18 -- A Deep Longing for God and Death

In 1969, what did Mother feel?

As confusion in the Church seemed to grow, Mother’s zeal burned brighter. Zeal is an effect of divine love. Love becomes zeal when it sees obstacles in its way. Zeal wants to remove obstacles to the growth of divine love. And Mother wanted to light the light of divine love in every human heart.

Episode 124 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.17 -- Be the One who will Satiate His Thirst

Can Christ’s thirst be satiated?

Yes. He thirsts for human persons to love Him. Christ is the head of the Church. He is our God and Lord. He thirsts for us to be happy. Our happiness is found only in Him. And Mother Teresa wanted to please Christ by bringing others into friendship with Him. But Christ also thirsts for love in his  body, the Church. Christ is present in his members, the members of the Church. Mother wanted to quench the thirst for love and being cared for and being wanted in the souls in whom Christ dwells. And this calling to satiate Christ’s thirst is something that each of us can respond to with love. What if we are the only one doing so? What if others are not doing so. Then let us be the one! How many people were quenching Christ’s thirst for love Nazareth after the annunciation? One! Mary.

Episode 123 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.16 -- I Have Never Had Doubt

Did Mother have doubts?

She never doubted God. She never doubted his goodness. But why then was she in such darkness? She doubted her own response to His goodness. She had difficultly knowing whether she loved Him. She was feeling unloved by Him. But her own state of soul is not revealed to us in the Revelation of Christ. Her own spiritual state was a matter of conjecture from the fruits she experienced. Mother Teresa had rock solid faith in the Lord. She had trouble discerning her own response. This was very painful to one who loved Him so deeply and who knew Him to be infinitely loveable.

Episode 122 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.15 -- I Know this is Only Feelings

What kind of advice did Mother Teresa sometimes ask for?

What books to read. The Missionaries of Charity are required to do spiritual reading each day. They had many books in their library. But Mother Teresa often found it hard to know what to read. And so she asked advice. Spiritual reading is important!

Episode 121 -- No Reason to Be Sad -- Come Be My Light ch 11.14

Why did Mother Teresa not want people to be sad for her?

God was doing something great. As her spiritual fathers grasped her interior suffering, they sometimes expressed sorrow for her state. Mother Teresa was very firm. Do not be sad for me, she insisted.

Episode 120 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.139 -- Pray for Me - That I may be Brave

Where was the first house opened outside India?

Venezuela. Mother Teresa now was friends with the Papal nuncio, the official representative of the Holy Father. She wrote him about the events in Venezuela. She told him of two men they found eaten up with worms. As they nursed the men back to health, one man asked for a cigarette. Mother reached in her bag and produced two packs of the finest cigarettes! A rich man had given them to her in the morning. This event made Mother very happy at God’s providential love for his poor.

Episode 119 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.12 -- He Takes Every Drop of Consolation from My Soul

How did the Lord treat Mother Teresa when the Society was officially approved by the Pope?

With profound interior pain. The Lord seemed to Mother Teresa to pour out his mercy on her Society while withdrawing from her his holy hand of sweetness. There seemed to be some proportion between his mercies to the sisters and Mother’s own sense of being unloved. As she shared in Christ’s thirst on the Cross, God was doing great things through her.

Episode 118 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.11 -- How Terrible it is To Be Without God

Episode 117 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.10 -- The Good God Called and I said Yes

How did Mother react when the Vatican asked for the historical origins of the Society and how did react to Sisters leaving the Society?

With humility. When the Missionaries of Charity applied for pontifical status as a worldwide religious order directly under the Pope, Mother Teresa did not put her own call forward in detail. She did not want to be the centre of consideration. She always wanted the Society to be judged by the work they were doing for Christ and His poor.

With deep pain. Mother Teresa loved all the Sisters who were part of this Society. She loved them with a supernatural love. She loved them with a motherly love. As a mother suffers when she sees her children hurting, so Mother felt great sorrow when two sisters left the Missionaries of Charity. We do not know the circumstances. Mother seems to have thought that a mistake was made somewhere. Perhaps they were not treated well. Mother not only felt sorrow, she wanted to learn from this painful event.

Episode 116 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.9 -- Only God Can Ask a Sacrifice Like This

Episode 115 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.8 -- What a Terrible World this Is Without the Love of Christ

Episode 114 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.7 -- How Treacherous Are My Feelings

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Episode 113 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.6 -- He Still Plays His Game

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Episode 112 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.5 -- Make me Share with Thee Thy Pain

How did Mother Teresa live Lent?

She wanted to give Christ a free hand. She wanted to share in his pains so that she could enter more fully into his love. At the same time, Mother Teresa taught her sisters during Lent. She passed onto to others the fruit of her own prayer and suffering.

How did all this suffering and teaching bear fruit? In 1963, Mother Teresa looked to a new moment in the life of her community. They applied for an even more permanent status in the law of the Church (canon law). They wanted to be of Pontifical rite. This means that they are directly approved by the Pope and under his guidance. They will no longer be simply of diocesan rite, under the guidance of one local bishop. They will be able more easily to spread all over the world!

Episode 111 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.4 -- The Fragrance of Christ’s Joy

Did Mother Teresa know both great joy and pain in her friendship with Christ?

Last episode we read about Mother Teresa's unwillingness to speak to great crowds. She believed she had special gifts to talk to her own Missionaries of Charity. Nevertheless, she would go where her bishop asked her to go.

In this episode we hear about a new development in the Missionaries of Charity. In 1963 the Missionary of Charity Brothers were formed. Mother's influence grew. She wanted her spiritual sons and daughters to be the fragrance of Christ’s joy.

As her work grew, the cost was heavy. We will also read about how Mother’s Lent in 1963 was spent. She wanted more and more to share with Christ in his pain.

 

Episode 110 -- Come Be My Light ch 11.3 -- I Give Whatever He Takes

How did Mother Teresa handle all the publicity her work generated?

Besides these trials, Mother began to face a new trial: publicity. People heard of her work and sought her out. They wanted to have her speak. They wanted interviews. How would she handle it.