Saint Teresa

The canonisation of Mother Teresa, to be held on September 4, became a formality after the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints cleared her candidacy and confirmed two certifiable miracles by her. That she will be canonised in a ceremony at the Vatican may come as a disappointment to the 20 million Catholics in India, who may have been praying for a visit of the “People’s Pope” to the country. Kolkata, the “City of Joy” and of very abject poverty, is the place where the “Angel of Mercy”, or “Saint of the Gutters”, is fervidly worshipped for her work with the poor between 1929, when she started her missionary and charity work in India, and her death in 1997. It would be appropriate if the city were to make most grand the planned thanksgiving ceremony.

The Albanian nun was considered a divisive figure by a band of critics who questioned many things about her operation, including finances and crises of faith revealed in posthumously published letters. But everything they said, including about her religious imperialism and her very rigid views on contraception, paled in comparison to the compassion she displayed for the unfortunate, racked by such diseases as leprosy. Her fast-tracking to sainthood is a testament to how highly Pope Francis regarded her after having met her once when he was still a bishop — he was overawed by her formidable commitment to her mission. What India remembers is her piety and compassion. To Indian believers she was a saint long before formal canonisation of the icon of self-sacrifice for the poor and destitute makes her Saint Teresa.