Mother Teresa's Secret Fire: The Encounter That Changed Her Life, and How It Can Transform Your Own [Hardcover]

When we come upon the life of Mother Teresa of Calcutta we are accustomed to hearing about her ministry to the "poorest of the poor". Her legacy is well known to people throughout the world for her globe trotting work helping the poor in the slums of Calcutta, AIDS patients, and other unfortunate people. Much is known about her life from Skjope of the former Yugoslavia to the streets of Calcutta, but far less is known about her inner life and motivation.

From Joseph Langford's `Mother Teresa's Secret Fire' we get a revealing portrait of her interior life. Centering on an intimate encounter with God on her way to a retreat while taking the Darjeeling train on September 10, 1946, Mother Teresa received a singular message from God about "His thirst" for souls. Noting that Jesus cried out "I thirst" before dying on the cross, Mother Teresa with a singular passion and who described herself often as the "pencil of God," elaborated about that thirst being not so much for water as a thirst for our souls.

Langford also expounds on this thirst. Tying the familiar events of Mother Teresa's life, including winning the Nobel Peace Prize, he gives light to her speeches, her journals and other writings which illustrate and elaborate what this divine thirst (or longing or ardent desire) for mankind entails. But once he establishes the prime mover of her inner life, he elaborates less about her life and more about her message. Having the support of scripture and the writings of formidable saints, Langford makes the case that divine thirst has been a theme of many a mystic's writings. (Who would not be taken by their metaphorical take on thirst from Psalm 42 "My soul thirsts for God, for the living God."?) Cogently, Mother Teresa's writings still convey God's message at a time when spiritual indifference and crisis seem to be coming to a climax.

Always returning to that ineffable encounter Mother Teresa had with God on the Darjeeling train, Langford manages to anchor his writing without seeming fragmented. The focus only improves during the reader's own journey which is enhanced by a meditation on the love of God and how our relationship to Him is seen as quenching Jesus's thirst when we return our love to Him. Sometimes he is too repetitive in the beginning about ideas that are sometimes hard for anyone to convey, but his clear improvement makes the sublime even more readable as the pages go on. One of the best passages comes late in the book where he reveals her written meditations about the Samaritan woman's encounter with Jesus at the well.

For its import and impact, this is clearly a five-star book, but for the presentation, I subjectively dock one star, yet I highly recommend this spiritual journey even for a few bumps along the way, which undoubtedly even Mother Teresa herself encountered on that Darjeeling train.

I remember seeing the photographer Linda Schaefer on EWTN's "The World Over" when she was out promoting her book "Come and See: A Photojournalist's Journey into the World of Mother Teresa." She recounted how she approached Mother to ask for permission to photograph her and her nuns working their mission.

Mother basically told Schaefer that there was no shortage of photographers from around the world requesting to take Mother's photograph (which no doubt was true); the shortage was in people willing to actually perform the less glamorous work, the immediate work: to help wash the feeble and tend to the sick.

Mother told the surprised photographer she could be most helpful by putting her camera away and by instead ministering to the people in need that were all around them. It was only after Schaefer did this that Mother let her start snapping some photographs.

I mention this story because I always tremble a bit when reading about Mother Teresa. I'm not afraid I will read an account or a biography and find her lacking; instead, I worry she will find me lacking, not only as a Catholic but as a human being in general.

It's an odd experience -- when you're reading about Mother Teresa, you feel like she is reading you, too. It's amazing how the power of her personality comes through in this book, even though she didn't write it. (It's clear that the author, Fr. Joseph Langford, knew her well.) She was a servant of God and a force of nature. It's in a saint like Mother Teresa that you find there is no separation between faith and good works -- faith compels works and works strengthen faith. What is one without the other? In short, Mother Teresa's life made it clear that true grace is always a call to love.

"Mother Teresa's Secret Fire" is a wonderful book. It is not strictly a biography, although it often touches on the facts of Mother's life, and it isn't just an anecdotal journal about what life was like working beside her, although the book touches on that, too. It's really a meditation on how Mother Teresa came to fully feel and to understand God's boundless love for her and for the rest of us, His weak and wounded children.

Fr. Langford isn't just out to convey a glimpse of this sainted woman -- he wants to save you by making Mother's understanding of God and His love known to you. It's a tall order, but Fr. Langford is, after all, a priest, and in the end he wants to accomplish what Mother wanted -- to bring people closer to God. I think with "Mother Teresa's Secret Fire," he does a fine job.

I have read many books about Mother Teresa and for me, this book is essential for fully understanding this holy soul who is inspiration for the world. Most importantly, Fr. Langford reveals to us the essence of Mother Teresa's mission, which sanctifies believers and unbelievers alike. She, once again, through the gift Fr. Langford has given to us, leads us closer to God. A must read for anyone who desires to know her.

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