Mother Teresa Quotes

" Peace begins with a smile."

" Service to Mankind is Service to God. "

" If you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one. "

" Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person. "

" Some people come in our life as blessings. Some come in your life as lessons. "

" Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. "

" Give, but give until it hurts. "

" A life not lived for others is not a life. "

" Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love."

" The most terrible poverty is loneliness, and the feeling of being unloved. "

" God doesn't require us to succeed, he only requires that you try. "

" Spread love everywhere you go. Let no one ever come to you without leaving happier."

" If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other."

" If you judge people, you have no time to love them."

" I'm a little pencil in the hand of a writing God, who is sending a love letter to the world."

" Let us always meet each other with smile, for the smile is the beginning of love."

" Every time you smile at someone, it is an action of love, a gift to that person, a beautiful thing."

" There are no great things, only small things with great love. Happy are those."

" Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless."

Mother Teresa Life & Living

         Nikola Bojaxhiu, a prosperous business man, and a multi-linguist who had widely traveled, was active in politics and the local church in Skopje, Macedonia. He wedded Dranafile Bernai, and soon became the father of three children. Aga, a daughter, Laza, a son, and Agnes Gonxha, a daughter. Agnes was born on 26 August, 1910. Gonxha in Albanian means flower bud.

Nikola passed on to his children a sense of ethnic identity and nationalist pride; however, it was Drana who nurtured the children's spiritual growth.

Agnes Gonxha often accompanied her mother, helping her as she made her way from family to family, offering both spiritual and material comfort. Dranas Christian charity offered a powerful example, helping to mould Agnes Gonxhas spiritual life and to shape her destiny.

In 1919, Agnes Gonxhas father was dead at the age of 45. Nikola Bojaxhius death devastated his wife; Drana fell into deep, prolonged, and often incapacitating grief. Dranas infuence on her children was extraordinary, especially after their fathers death. So powerful was Dranas presence that Agnes Gonxha recalled, Home is where the mother is.

Besides her mother, the Sacred Heart church exercised the most influence on young Gonxha. I was only twelve years old... when I felt the desire to become a nun, Mother Teresa recalled. Father Franjo Jambrekovic, a young Jesuit priest passed on to the members of Sacred Heart Parish the news of the missionary efforts that the Jesuits had undertaken. The missionaries wrote impassioned letters describing the horrible conditions under which the poor and the in lived in India. The zeal with which Father Jambrekovic spoke of the Jesuit missions in India, sparked a renewed sense of devotion in Agnes Gonxha. The more she heard about the missions in India, the more she was drawn to the possibility of working there. Agnes Gonxha had grown into an attractive young woman, a good student, neat and clean in appearance, self-disciplined, and well organized, she had already earned a reputation in the community for her friendliness and willingness to help anyone. But Gonxha was struggling with her decision to become a nun.

Trying to decide the mission of her life, Gonxha turned to Father Jambrekovic for advice. In later years, Mother Teresa acknowledged that there was no doubt in her mind about her decision, stating simply that God had made the choice for her. One day, after returning home from a visit to the shrine of the Madonna, Agnes Gonxha informed her mother that she had made up her mind to become a nun. Because of her interest in missionary work, she intended to apply to the order of the Loreto Sisters, an Irish branch of the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary who worked with the Jesuits in Bengal.

Drana gave her daughter her blessing, but also warned her that in choosing to become a nun, she must turn her life over to God without doubt, without fear, without hesitation, and without remorse. The time came for Gonxha to leave Skopje. She was to travel to Paris, where the Mother Superior of the Loreto Sisters was to interview her to determine whether Agnes Gonxha was acceptable to the order. On August 15, 1928, guests came to the Agnes Bojaxhiu home to wish her farewell and her friends gathered to wish the Bojaxhiu woman a safe journey. Finally, on October 8, Agnes Gonxha, accompanied by another young woman, Betika Kanjc, who also hoped to join the Loreto Sisters, boarded the train to Paris. Waving goodbye, Agnes Gonxha bid farewell to her mother, whom she never saw again.

 As the train pulled away from the Zagreb station on its way to Paris, Gonxha must have thought about the consequences of her decision. Not only was she leaving her family and friends, she was also leaving the only home she had ever known. If the Loreto Sisters accepted her application, it would mean lifetime separation from her family and her country. She could probably never even visit her homeland again. The chances of her family visiting her were equally remote; travel was expensive and there would be little opportunity for her mother, brother, or sister to come to India. Whether she felt sad and lonely as the train rolled on toward Paris, Gonxha knew that she had made the right choice. Her life belonged to God.

M O T H E R T E R E S A -THE LORETO SISTERS :

         Beginning in 1834, the Jesuits began arriving in Bengal near Calcutta with a mission to serve the poor. They established St. Xaviers School in which they taught Catholics, Hindus, and Muslims alike. It soon became apparent, though, that the community needed a separate school for the daughters of Irish Catholic military families.

When approached about the possibility of sending nuns to India to staff the girls school, Mother Teresa gently but refused. There were too many children in Ireland in need of assistance. There was also a shortage of nuns. Her German visitor countered that in refusing to send members of her order to India. The case went before the entire community; they would decide whether to accept the mission to India.

In the end, seven sisters decided to go to India, marking the beginning of Loreto missionary work there. On August 23, 1841, the seven, accompanied by two priests and six postulants, or novice nuns, set sail. Almost four months later, they disembarked in Calcutta. disembarked in Calcutta. The little band took possession of the house at 5 Middleton Row, where they were to live and teach. The sisters prepared the once lavishly furnished house into simpler living quarters and classrooms. The 67-foot dining room became the school hall.

The sisters then traveled to the local orphanage near the cathedral of Our Lady of the Rosary to meet the church officials and the children. Finally, on January 10, 1842, the Loreto School opened its doors to boarders and day students.

The initial reports that Mother Teresa received from India were enthusiastic. Streams of volunteers now offered to go to India to aid the Loreto Sisters of Calcutta. In spite of a number of nuns dying of cholera, the flow of volunteers did not stop. It was this pioneering and courageous group of teachers that Gonxha Bojaxhiu soon hoped to join.

On December 1, 1928, the two women Gonxha and Betika set sail for India. Upon their arrival there, the two would begin their novitiate, that is the period of study and prayer which every nun takes before her vows. The sea voyage proved long and arduous, winding its way Suez Canal, then the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean, and the Bay of Bengal. On January 6, 1929, the ship arrived at Calcutta. But at this point, Gonxha had little chance to become acquainted with her surroundings. After just a few days, on January 16, she was sent to the Loreto Novitiate located in Darjeeling, a fashionable hill resort about 400 miles north of Calcutta.

LIFE IN THE LORETO CONVENT :

         Life at the Loreto Convent for Gonxha Bojaxhiu was disciplined and rigorous. Entering a Catholic convent during the early twentieth century was like being plunged into another world, one that was isolated and relatively contained. For the next two years, dressed in the black habit and veil of the order, Gonxha kept up with her English studies as well as learning the Bengali language. Under the watchful eye of the novice mistress, who oversaw the novitiates' training, the young woman went weekly to confession. Dinnertime was spent listening to one of the sisters reading about the lives of the saints, or from the rules of Loreto. Every day from 9 to 11, Gonxha and the other novitiates taught at St. Teresa's School, a one-room schoolhouse affiliated with the convent. Here 20 small boys and girls met to receive instruction. She quickly earned a reputation for being hard working, cheerful, and charitable in her dealings with others. On March 24, 1931, Gonxha Bojaxhiu took her ?rst vows-a lifetime promise to charity, poverty, and obedience to God as a sister of Loreto.

At this time, Gonxha chose a new name Teresa for herself to symbolize her new life with God. For the sisters in the Loreto Convent, however, the new Teresa soon had a nickname that further distinguished her: Bengali Teresa, an acknowledgment of her ability to speak the language so well.

BENGALI TERESA :

         Gonxha Bojaxhiu, now called Sister Teresa, took the train from Darjeeling to Calcutta. There, she was to begin teaching at St. Mary's School, located in the eastern district of Calcutta. It was to be her place of residence and work for the next 17 years.

During the 1920s, the contrast between the cities of Darjeeling and Calcutta was startling. In Darjeeling, one breathed clear mountain air, and a walk in a flower-filled meadow was not far away. But the city of Calcutta teemed with humanity, overcrowded and spilling into the streets and alleys throughout. It was on one hand a city enriched by the culture and arts of India; on the other, it was a cesspool of human misery and degradation.

M O T H E R T E R E S A - ST. MARY'S SCHOOL :

          The school was hidden from the everyday world by high gray walls and tall iron gates. Upon passing through them entrance gates, one came upon a complex of buildings with playing ?elds and well-tended lawns. The campus comprised several buildings of varying architectural styles. Besides an administrative building and smaller gray classroom building was St. Mary's School. There were also quarters for the nuns and for those students who boarded at the school, mostly orphans, girls from broken homes, and children with only one parent. The school had already established a reputation for itself. Established in 1841, as one of the six Loreto schools in Calcutta, the Calcutta school in Entally educated orphans, the sons and daughters of the affluent and foreign families living in the city. All children wore the same uniform; there was no distinction by the sisters of the rich from the poor, the European from the Indian, Catholic from non-Catholic.