Mother Teresa of Calcutta: Essence of Global Harmony
TRANSCEND MEMBERS, 17 Oct 2011
Charles Mercieca, Ph.D. – TRANSCEND Media Service
Mother Teresa was born in Skopje in Macedonia under the name of Agnes Gonxha, Bojaxhiu. She was born on August 26, 1910 and passed away on September 5, 1997. She spent her lifetime bringing peace and joy in the hearts of many that she soon began to be viewed by spiritual writers as the essence of global harmony. Although she was small in physical stature, yet in the spiritual sphere she proved to be a gigantic figure, standing high above others.
Mission in Perspective
For 45 years she ministered the poor, sick, orphans and dying in many countries, although she spent the bulk of her time in Calcutta. Needless to say, she did not have an easy life. In her effort to bring God’s peace and love in the hearts of people, she had to struggle and overcome numerous obstacles. She saw the presence of God in every human being, regardless of being good or bad. In view of this, she treated everyone with deep respect.
She firmly believed that with true love and genuine respect for others we can bring about peace in this world. In fact, she viewed love as the secret of success in our work, regardless of how difficult and impossible it may seem to be eventually. She never made money the condition for her work. Her secret of success can be traced to her belief in prayer and sacrifice. She also believed that the more we give to others the more we end up receiving from others.
In fact, many residences were donated to her Missionary Sisters of Charity ending up having 610 missions in 123 countries. By the time she passed away she had 4,000 sisters ministering to those in dire need across every continent in the entire world. The global harmonious community she tried so hard to create led her to receive the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979. Needless to say, she received a lot of honors from heads of state including the US President Ronald Reagan. Mother Teresa was totally detached from the material things of this world.
This means she lived as she always wanted, namely, to be at the constant service of the poorest of the poor. Needless to say, she got her inspiration mostly from her Lord and Master, Jesus of Nazareth. She tried to join Him in her distress and obstacles she faced in his agony prior to His crucifixion and harsh death. Mother Teresa was full of virtue, from where she got all of her strength. She was humble, patient, determined, courageous and revealed perseverance in all of her undertakings. As many said quite often, she revealed to be a real living saint.
Beneficial Legacy in Operation
In fact, shortly after she passed away people from all over the world that knew her, were looking forward for her canonization. As a result, Pope John Paul II beatified her a few years after and became officially known as Blessed Teresa of Calcutta. This is one step that precedes canonization. In her travels around the world, she was treated with great respect by people from all walks of life and professions and by people from every culture and religion.
Mother Teresa, who became the essence of global harmony in the eyes of the world, won the admiration of many to the extent that quite a good number were converted and started to lead a much better life. She proved by her work and actions that the greatness of human beings is not measured by the riches they have, the position they occupy in life or the shape of their body. Rather, their greatness is to be measured by the degree of their virtues.
For those who are genuinely interested in coming across her in person, there are many videos that were made of speeches she gave on a variety of topics across the world. She was a soft speaker whose capability to touch your heart deeply could not be ignored or taken lightly. In this world of ours we might have experienced individuals who tried to shake the world through hatred and revenge. This was never the case with Mother Teresa who tried to reform our global community through self sacrifice, true dedication and genuine love.
If we were to study her work properly we could conclude that if the military in every nation were to be replaced by the Missionaries of Charity, which Mother Teresa founded, permanent peace would soon become a feasibility that cannot be taken lightly. The secret of world peace lies in our ability to eventually develop a genuine global harmony, following the example of Mother Teresa of Calcutta without any hesitation.
In view of this, we need to develop the habit to make substantial contributions for world peace through the development of global harmony, which would make everyone a winner and no one a loser.
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Charles Mercieca, Ph.D. – President, International Association of Educators for World Peace, Dedicated to United Nations Goals of Peace Education, Environmental Protection, Human Rights & Disarmament.
-Professor Emeritus, Alabama A&M University.
-Hon President & Professor, SBS Swiss Business School, Zurich.
-Member, TRANSCEND-A Network for Peace, Development and Environment.
This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 17 Oct 2011.
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