I finished reading the book "Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light" (Doubleday 2007). The book collects her letters and some letters to her; these reveal the 55-year-long spiritual condition of Mother Teresa called "dark night of soul." Soon after she received her "call within a call" to found the Missionaries of Charity, she felt abandoned by God, alone, rejected, worthless. Early on, she wrote:
"Please pray for me, that it may please God to lift this darkness from my soul for only a few days. For sometimes the agony of desolation is so great and at the same time the longing for the Absent One so deep, that the only prayer which I can still say is - Sacred Hear of Jesus I trust in Thee - I will satiate Thy thirst for souls."
When these feelings first came she was puzzled, but she never wavered in loving Christ, even when she felt rejected by Him. She did not mind her "feelings" and focused on her work, anchored herself in firm faith in Jesus. Not feeling connected with Jesus made her connect in a deeper way with the poor, the sick, the hungry, the rejected, the abandoned in whom she saw Christ. They were not just "like Christ;" they were Christ.
Some of her spiritual confessors had suggested to her that her dark night of the soul was her intimate sharing of Christ's Passion. He too felt abandoned, rejected - "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me."
Edited by Brian Kolodiejchuk who was one of her champions for her sainthood, the book is a fascinating look at this woman who suffered much interiorly, but never showed her sufferings to the rest of the world, and she never wavered in her love and commitment to God. This was a woman who had visions of Jesus and Mary, who conversed with them, but who remained practical and grounded, as to allow her to found an order and make it grow. She gave God all the credit; but certainly God availed of Mother Teresa's common sense, intellect, passion, and unwavering love and commitment to the poorest of the poor.
She had a grand life - a love story featuring her love for Jesus and the poorest of the poor (whom she saw as Christ disguised).
About Me
- Cecilia Manguerra Brainard
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- Cecilia Manguerra Brainard's official website is ceciliabrainarddotcom. She is the award-winning author and editor of 22 books, including When the Rainbow Goddess Wept, The Newspaper Widow, Magdalena, Selected Stories, Vigan and Other Stories, and more. She edited Growing Up Filipino 1, 2, & 3, Fiction by Filipinos in America, Contemporary Fiction by Filipinos in America, and other books.. Her work has been translated into Finnish and Turkish; and many of her stories and articles have been widely anthologized. Cecilia has received many awards, including a California Arts Council Fellowship in Fiction, a Brody Arts Fund Award, a Special Recognition Award for her work dealing with Asian American youths, as well as a Certificate of Recognition from the California State Senate, 21st District, and the Outstanding Individual Award from her birth city, Cebu, Philippines. She has lectured and performed at UCLA, USC, University of Connecticut, University of the Philippines, PEN, Shakespeare & Company in Paris, and many others. She has served in the Board of literary arts groups such as PEN, PAWWA (Pacific Asian American Writers West), among others.
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