One Dose of Reality Too Much

It's nothing if not fascinating to read recently-revealed doubts hosted by none other than Mother Teresa, about the presence of a Holy Spirit, a guiding light leading humankind to the salvation of recognition and a higher modality in the spirit of life. "How painful is this unknown pain - I have no Faith", she wrote in one of her many letters expressing her anguished doubt.

Her outer demeanor was one of positive serenity, and her actions in the slums of India, caring for the truly lost and neglected, the flotsam of humanity, was testament to her selflessness as a human being. Everyone assumed she was inspired by God, by a vision brought down to her through His intervention, drawing her to her life-time of work on behalf of the indigent and the ill, the homeless and the lunatic.

Well, she was initially inspired by God, by a vision, by a holy demand which she took immediate steps to meet. But somewhere along the way the vision dimmed and her trust was shattered. One might imagine that she, as an Albanian woman living in Macedonia, would have had reason to doubt long before her immersion in her life work in India.

To witness the acerbic suspicion, hatred, vulgarity of expression and demeanor; the reasonless brutality that was manifest between resident Serbs, Macedonians, Albanians must surely have given her pause. To have knowledge of the restive relations, often expressed in the most surly, ungovernably-violent ways between Christians and Muslims must surely have troubled her.

But it was in India, in the clasp of its endemic poverty, among the lost of the earth, the dross of an ancient and fabled civilization, where she experienced her epiphany of loss, when she discovered not a vision but a total collapse of faith. Who could blame her? This woman worked assiduously, tirelessly, sometimes with ill grace, but always with purpose, toward alleviating the plight of the ill, the downtrodden, the homeless, the starving.

Although the Roman Catholic Church is in the speedy process of delivering her into sainthood in an expression of appreciation of her devotion, the truth appeared to be that her devotion was to the plight of the needy - of her own tender volition - not to the Church. Yet the very fact that she struggled so bitterly with her loss of faith, is, in the end, a tribute to her.

For the very fact that she was motivated not through faith and her belief in the Almighty and His direction of her life, but rather because of her own fragile humanity, speaks volumes about the strength of purpose and character of this indomitable woman. She worked on behalf of those whose miserable presence on earth was of no moment, and certainly of no concern to anyone but herself.

All the trappings of religion, of serving God, of performing of miracles, of endowing this woman with piety and a heavenly vision are trite manipulations, but useful to the church she was said to be part of and performed on behalf of. Reality is, as so often happens, quite different. And for that reason, she is due a greater degree of respect than formerly envisaged.

Mother Teresa was a remarkable personage in her own right. Thrust into action by the pitiable of the world. Her own sense of compassion and duty led her to sacrifice herself to their well-being.

She was misunderstood. But she understood well what she required of herself.