Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light [Hardcover]

What initially attracted me to 'Come Be My Light' was the fact it is based on the personal corespondence Mother Teresa had with her spiritual advisors and others throughout her life. After her death it was revealed that she suffered through periods of spiritual darkness-this was something i wanted to explore in more detail. What shocked me about the book is the fact that after Mother Teresa heard 'the call' while on a train to Darjeeling to leave her teaching position and go into the slums of Calcutta, she had no sense of the presence of God again throughout her life. This is the core of the book-her letters are a form of reaching out for help from her spiritual advisors who seem to do nothing more than reframe things so she can continue with her work. I found the book disturbing in that it showed, at least for me, Mother Teresa's convoluted view on suffering (if God allows it you must accept it) and the church's collaboration in its attempt to make her a modern day saint. The book eventually became tedious and I found myself skimming through the final chapters.While 'Come Be My Light' provides a rather startling glimpse of Mother Teresa's inner life, it wasn't nearly as inspiring as I had hoped.

This is not a book for those who are looking for a feel good story. It's a deeply personal story of a woman who loved God beyond everything, and struggled... as we all do... in the darkness. It's an encouragement to those of us who have lost the feelings of God. It's wonderful fruit for daily prayers, and the 'real stuff' of faith. God bless the priests who had the courage to save her letters and publish them for our benefit. Her humility desired them to remain private, but we are blessed to have them. Mother Theresa, Pray for us!

There is hope in this book for anyone who has ever felt despair especially in yearning for contact with God and not finding it except perhaps in the goodness (Godness?) of others. Despite a darkness and dryness which seems to have persisted for all but one month of her adult life as a woman religious, Mother Teresa admits to this kind of loneliness, while still putting on a "happy face". I'm identifying.

The reality is that the world would likely not know of Blessed Teresa of Calcutta apart from the work of Malcolm Muggeridge who found her and who then produced the film, "Something Beautiful for God". When I was a secondary school teacher I showed this film to my classes year in and year out. I still wonder what happened to that tiny baby girl to whom Mother talks at one point and tells Muggeridge that there is a light in the baby's eye and she thinks "she will make it".

I have had the opportunity to visit the motherhouse of the community in Calcutta. I had hoped to see the babies there but couldn't because "The children are having chicken pox", the sign outside the orphanage said. I was offered the chance to wait to meet Mother Teresa herself as she made her way to the chapel but decided I wasn't up to that. I might actually have been afraid to meet her and I still don't know why. Would she have seen the progressive version of Christianity which is now my own approach to the tradition? And would she perhaps not have approved?

I'm glad the book was written. I could do without the pious language of the priest who is her postulator. I can deal with it in terms of Mother Teresa herself because it was the language of the spirituality of the Roman Catholic Church when I was growing up. I know that she insisted on that language and those practises for her Missionaries of Charity long after Vatican Council II. I have been in their convents in India and they are by and large happy places. Or at least they seem to be. Maybe the sisters are following Mother's rule to go with joyful faces to those whom they are sent to serve.

There are many women religious in India in particular who long before Mother Teresa were doing what she did. She was right, though, when she pointed out that many of them were asked to become Europeans rather than stay Indians in their formation process. And for that she is to be given much credit. I do not think, as some of her critics do, that she was dishonest in presenting one face to her spiritual directors and another to her community and the world at large. When I am feeling hopeless, I don't want to spread that sadness. When I am joyful, I do want to spread that gift. Perhaps it's my age. Perhaps it's my anger at the contemporary penchant for turning every encounter into some kind of psychotherapy session, but I admire the woman's stamina and am inspired by the book to do the same in my life. For more details on Mother Teresa readers might want to consult www.bishopbhai.org and look for comments there about her.