Mother Teresa (Albania-India)
Here is his story: “In the summer of 1987, I had just finished my third year in San Quentin prison in California. On this particular day at 8:30 in the morning, I went into my cell to change my clothes. I was thinking of wearing gym shorts because I was going to play basketball with my friend Bobby Harris. We always play basketball with him in the morning, after lifting weights for a while. As I sat on the tier, double-tying my shoes, the guard on the gun rail came down and asked what I was doing.
“What does it look like?” I asked him. “I’m getting ready to go rock up on the roof. That is what I do every day after I lift weights,” I added. “You are going to miss Mother Theresa,” the guard said. “She’s coming today to see you guys.” I looked at him with a cynical smile. “You cops will do anything to keep from running us to the yard, wont you? I have not missed this little sweetie. If she appears, let her come to my gym. I may throw her into the basket.” “Okay,” said the guard, “Do not tell me later that you have not been warned.” He turned and walked away, and an alarm clock sounded in my head. “The guard has given up rather too quickly,” I said to myself.
I left the cell and went to the gym. But after awhile I heard the sergeant saying, “Don’t go into your cells and lock up. Mother Teresa stayed to see you guys, too.” So I jogged up to the front in gym shorts and a tattered basketball shirt with the arms ripped out, and on the other side of the security screen was this tiny woman who looked 100 years old. Yes, it was Mother Teresa.
You have to understand that, basically, I’m a dead man. I don’t have to observe any sort of social convention; and as a result, I can break all the rules, say what I want. It cannot get any worse for me. But one look at this woman, whom so many people view as a living saint, and I was speechless. Incredible vitality and warmth came from her wizened, piercing eyes. She smiled at me, blessed a religious medal, and handed it to me. I wouldn’t have walked voluntarily to the front of the tier to see the Warden, the Governor, the President, or the Pope. I could not care less about them. But standing before this woman, all I could say was, “Thank you, Mother Teresa.”
Then I stepped back to let another dead man come forward to receive his medal. I stood there, looked at the medal and thought that I would send it to my wife. I knew that she would like it very much. After all, when she was young, she wanted to become a nun. Then it occurred to me that her sister would be absolutely jealous. Perhaps, I thought, I should try to get a second medal.
I walked the few steps back and asked Mother Teresa for a medal for my sister-in-law. She smiled, blessed one, and handed it to me. Once again, the warmth of her presence surrounded me, then Mother Teresa turned and pointed her hand at the sergeant on the shelf: “What you do to these men,” she told him, “you do to God.” The sergeant almost faded away in surprise and wonder…
Then they brought a camera, and some guards began to take photographs with Mother Teresa. I was amazed at how professionally she stood in front of the camera. Although, of course, she was used to be photographed with the most influential and famous people in the world.
That night, as I wrote my wife and sister-in-law and sent their medals, I told them I could not help thinking about Mother Teresa. I could not help reflecting on how this woman had chosen to live her life and what she had accomplished, and how I in contrast had just thrown my life away. It was a humbling experience.
So, Mother Teresa came and went. The sergeant was affected by her words for a whole day and a half, just until lunch. My wife, who is also named Teresa (although I call her just Terri), started wearing the medal on a chain around her neck. It became one of her prized possessions. As time went by, however, I began to forget how powerful I had found Mother Teresa’s presence. Usually, in talking about her visit, I would just joke that she kept the sarge at bay for thirty-six hours.
Then, in 1989, my fifth year on death row, my wife told me that she could not remain married to me any longer. It was one of the toughest experiences of my life, right up there with when my mother died. Terri told me that she still loved me, but being married to a dead man was just too difficult.
We divorced shortly after my death-penalty appeal was rejected by the California Supreme Court. I was at my lowest ebb emotionally. This is when I began to recall the strength and warmth I had felt in Mother Teresa’s presence. I wrote to Terri and asked if I could borrow the medal with Virgin Mary that Mother Teresa had blessed for me. The medal would be hers, of course. I just wanted to borrow it to recapture some strength from that remarkable woman. I would return the medal when I left death row, probably upon my execution. Terri sent it to me with a chain, telling me she did not wear it anymore. Since our divorce, Terri had started wearing my wedding band (the one I had worn during our marriage and returned to Terri) on a chain around her neck instead. It made her feel closer to me, Terry said. But she did not miss San Quentin or walking past the gas chamber to see me each week. We began to correspond regularly again, and Terry, through her letters, has become very much a part of my life once more.
Now I wear Mother Theresa’s medal every day. I feel linked by it to both the woman who blessed it and handed it to me through the prison bars, and the woman who wore it during marriage. It continues to lend me strength in my darkest moments.
Before the execution of my friend Bobby Harris, Mother Teresa appealed to Governor Pete Wilson asking for his pardon. Her request did not help Bobby, but I was glad that Mother Teresa had not forgotten about him.
Bobby had a spiritual mentor. I have none. But I know that when I am executed, my medal will help me, Mother Teresa will help me. And then it will be sent back to my Terry, the woman with whom it has tied me for eternity.
Michael Wayne Hunter
The first time Mother Teresa saw the need to help criminals was back in India, when the city administration of Bengal asked her to help women serving their time for prostitution. Mother Teresa gladly responded, and personally joined the project of rehabilitation of Indian prisoners. At present, there are 926 prisons in India, where about 200,000 prisoners are confined.
On September 5, 1997, all the newspapers reported that Mother Theresa passed away. She died of cardiac arrest, leaving behind only two saris, her Bible, prayer book, several diaries, and pencils. Mother Teresa left so many things unfinished…
Upon learning of the death of Princess Diana on September 1, Mother Teresa said: “I do not always understand the ways of the Lord. It could be that this tragic loss means much more than we can imagine.” She died of heart disease four days later.
Mother Teresa intended to pray for the repose of Lady Diana’s soul. Farewell ceremony for the princess was to be held at St. Thomas’s Cathedral on Saturday, September 6, but Mother Teresa died one day before Saturday. On the morning of September 5, she wrote a message to sisters, brothers, fathers, and missionaries. The letter only had to be signed …
Mother Teresa had been suffering from heart disease for many years. She was first taken into a hospital with a heart attack in August of 1983. In 1989, another, much more serious, heart attack followed. It was then that the doctors implanted an electronic heart stimulant into her. In 1990, Mother Teresa felt so bad that she had to give up the position of the head of the Missionaries of Charity. The Vatican was looking for a new candidate, but never found one. And Mother Teresa, after her recovery, continued her work. In 1991, there was another hospital, this time — a cardiac centre in California. In 1993, during her trip to Rome, Mother Teresa broke three ribs, and this incident permanently undermined the nun’s health.
Since August 1996, she was hospitalized six times. She asked the doctors to let her die peacefully. “I cannot use expensive medical care when millions of my patients are deprived of such an opportunity,” Mother Teresa said. She never took pain medication, believing that suffering from pain means to offer a sacrifice to Christ.
Nuns of the Missionaries of Charity, as much as they could, tried to safeguard the fragile health of Mother Teresa. Her favourite time of day was the morning. The morning mass begins at 6 am. Every evening, Mother Teresa set the alarm clock for 4. “I want to wake up first to see Jesus,” she said. The sisters asked her to take care of herself, not to get up so early. They even had to hide the alarm clock, so that Mother Teresa slept a little longer. When she died, one of the nuns said, “Now she does not need an alarm clock to anticipate seeing Jesus, she went to Him herself. Now they are together for eternity.”
The funeral of Mother Theresa was majestic and pompous. In India, a nationwide mourning was declared. Only the presidents and prime ministers were buried here in this manner. Mother Teresa herself would probably prefer a modest ceremony. But the friends of the celebrated nun, the Catholic Church, and the Indian authorities insisted that the funeral be held with the greatest honours.
In the first hours after death, Mother Teresa’s body was embalmed, but Calcutta’s 40-degree heat and 100% humidity still provided grounds for concern. Mother Teresa died at the headquarters of the Order of Missionaries of Charity, so her body was placed first in a small chapel at the Order. There, surrounded by real flowers and praying nuns, the coffin stood for just 24 hours. The chapel was too small and was not suitable for the farewell ceremony.
On early Sunday morning, September 7, the coffin with the body of the famous nun was transported to St. Thomas’ Cathedral. People began to gather at the cathedral before dawn, and by the time the coffin arrived, a crowd was surrounding the chapel of the cathedral. Indian castes and privileges were taken into account even here. Politicians and high-ranking officials drove up to St. Thomas’s Cathedral in large white cars and passed into the chapel through a separate entrance. Students, shopkeepers and merchants, children, and women were patiently waiting for their turn, when it would be possible to enter the chapel for at least a few minutes to say goodbye to Mother Teresa.
St. Thomas’s Cathedral was visited by the Prime Minister of India, Inder Kumar Gujral. He said that Mother Teresa was a person who devoted her life to the poor of India. It was I. K. Gujral, who insisted that Mother Teresa be buried with honours, which only the heads of the state in India are honoured with. The Prime Minister wrote a poem dedicated to Mother Teresa, in which he called her “an apostle of love for humanity.”
The glass coffin with Mother Teresa’s body remained in St. Thomas’s Cathedral for a whole week, and then was transported to the Netaji Indoor stadium, where the funeral ceremony was held. More than a million people took to the streets of Calcutta, when Mother Teresa’s body was transported to the stadium.
The coffin covered with the national flag of India was carried around the city on the same gun carriage, which was used for the burial ceremonies of Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of independent India. A crowd seven kilometres long was following the coffin. To the sound of the funeral march, the coffin with Mother Teresa’s body moved along Calcutta streets. In the honorary cortege, there were 12 nuns, who helped Mother Teresa create the Order of Missionaries of Charity in 1950.
A niece of the late nun, Agi Bojaxhiu came to the funeral. She said that she had first seen her aunt, when she was already twenty years old, but after that they often met in Rome, where Mother Teresa came due to the affairs of the order. “I never thought that she was so much respected all over the world,” Miss Bojaxhiu said, “For me, she was always just an aunt.”
Poor barefooted people, famous film actors, and statesmen were crying and praying at the coffin of Mother Teresa, “Mother Teresa, we’ll never forget you!” — a piece of paper with such an inscription hung on the neck of a little boy. The child wept bitterly, there were so many tears that his homemade placard was completely soaked and the letters on it were blurred.
The inhabitants of the homes of charity were not allowed to come to the stadium to say goodbye to Mother Teresa. They watched the ceremony on rented television sets. Many of them watched television for the first time in their lives.
Mother Teresa was buried in the courtyard of the headquarters of the Order of Missionaries of Charity, located near the city slums. Only the close friends of the deceased, several nuns, and high-ranking religious figures from India and other countries were present at the burial. Thousands of people gathered around the “Mother’s Home” to have at least a glimpse at what was happening inside. Mother Teresa was loved by the inhabitants of Calcutta, revered for her care for the poor, the homeless, and the abandoned. These people have long considered her a saint.
The Vatican announced that it would take at least five years to decide whether Mother Teresa should be canonized. During these years, the Church would carefully study the life of Mother Teresa and her deeds, lest a mistake is made. “We must be sure that these deeds are in full accordance with the teachings of Christ,” said the representative of the Vatican.
Many priests, however, anticipating the official decision, already proclaimed her a saint. The cardinal of New York, John O’Connor did so, risking to provoke the Pope’s discontent. “We lost a woman who lived in a halo of holiness, like no one else in the world,” he said.
Pope John Paul II was not trying to conceal his tears when speaking of Mother Teresa. He called her life one of the greatest events of this century. American Mormons called her the source of inspiration for the whole world. The President of Iran explained the reason of her greatness by the fact that she returned dignity and respect to the fallen, drawing strength in her sincere faith. The Russian Orthodox Church particularly noted that the mercy of the deceased nun Teresa knew no boundaries, nationalities, and races: for her, every person bore the image and likeness of God. And the head of the Armenian church said that “she really was a mother for many miserable people.”
“Mother Teresa was the only person on Earth who dared to speak to any audience about her unaceptance of abortion, even the Pope could not afford it,” says one of the nurses of the Missionaries of Charity. “When John Paul II denounced abortion in a speech at a special conference at UN, he quoted Mother Teresa much. Apparently, it was more convenient for him to do it that way.”
As soon as the news of the death of Mother Teresa became known, telegrams and letters of condolences were sent to the Missionaries of Charity in various countries: “Sincere condolences from the inhabitants of Bangalore (India) on the occasion of the death of our Mother Teresa. She was the Mother of every human being, Mother of the poor, Mother of the sick, Mother of the lonely, and Mother of the unborn.”
“Mother Theresa was a diamond in the crown of India. She was a living saint, and now she went to God to pray there for those for whom she lived and worked on the earth.”
“She was sent to our mournful world to give mercy to the sick, console the hopeless, feed the hungry, accompany the dying people to the last path, and teach us and those who will come after us how to respond to love, which was granted by God to mankind.”
This article has been translated from the following web-site: http://motherteresa.ru