The dark night of Mother Teresa's soul
The saint-to-be had a troubled faith and her dark night lasted for decades.
This is the news from the soon-to-be published volume of her letters, "Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light."
She referred sometimes to Jesus as "The Absent One'' and struggled to feel the touch of God's spirit.
She once wrote to a spiritual confidant, "Jesus has a very special love for you . . . [but] as for me, the silence and the emptiness is so great that I look and do not see, listen and do not hear. The tongue moves [in prayer] but does not speak.''
Reports have referred to this as "doubt," and that may be part of it, but it seems to me that this is something deeper than that and possibly worse to endure.
In the above-quoted letter, she obviously believes in Jesus and his power... for others. It is her own soul in doubt.
But she still ministered, still worked, still sent prayers into the void.
As Frederick Buechner once wrote, "Doubt isn't the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith.''
Any believer who has never doubted his or her faith is either a fool or a liar.
And to wander in the desert, to desperately want to feel the touch of God, to need above all to hear "the still small voice'' in the wilderness and to spend every hour empty-handed and empty-hearted must be to feel bereft.
Only a mature faith can stand it. This sort of thing isn't for the queasy.
Maybe Mother Teresa took some comfort in knowing that Christ felt the same way -- the silence in Gethsemane when he asked for the cup to be taken from him, the cry from the cross, "My God, my God why hast thou forsaken me?''
What feels less real to me is this crop of positive thinking TV preachers, who always seem so shiny and happy and cheerful and let us in on how they and God chit-chat every day and how we can get in on the kaffeeklatch if we just smile and be nice.
"Nice'' ain't bad; but it's not a word I'd use to describe Jesus, and a deep faith is battered and bruised if it's to enter the fray of the real world.
My prayer is that Mother Teresa has found the joy that so often seemed just out of reach or a million miles away.
This is the news from the soon-to-be published volume of her letters, "Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light."
She referred sometimes to Jesus as "The Absent One'' and struggled to feel the touch of God's spirit.
She once wrote to a spiritual confidant, "Jesus has a very special love for you . . . [but] as for me, the silence and the emptiness is so great that I look and do not see, listen and do not hear. The tongue moves [in prayer] but does not speak.''
Reports have referred to this as "doubt," and that may be part of it, but it seems to me that this is something deeper than that and possibly worse to endure.
In the above-quoted letter, she obviously believes in Jesus and his power... for others. It is her own soul in doubt.
But she still ministered, still worked, still sent prayers into the void.
As Frederick Buechner once wrote, "Doubt isn't the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith.''
Any believer who has never doubted his or her faith is either a fool or a liar.
And to wander in the desert, to desperately want to feel the touch of God, to need above all to hear "the still small voice'' in the wilderness and to spend every hour empty-handed and empty-hearted must be to feel bereft.
Only a mature faith can stand it. This sort of thing isn't for the queasy.
Maybe Mother Teresa took some comfort in knowing that Christ felt the same way -- the silence in Gethsemane when he asked for the cup to be taken from him, the cry from the cross, "My God, my God why hast thou forsaken me?''
What feels less real to me is this crop of positive thinking TV preachers, who always seem so shiny and happy and cheerful and let us in on how they and God chit-chat every day and how we can get in on the kaffeeklatch if we just smile and be nice.
"Nice'' ain't bad; but it's not a word I'd use to describe Jesus, and a deep faith is battered and bruised if it's to enter the fray of the real world.
My prayer is that Mother Teresa has found the joy that so often seemed just out of reach or a million miles away.
posted by Michael Riley at 2:03 PM
14 Comments:
Wow. Kudos to you, Mr. Riley. That is a great write up. I love Mother Teresa. (Actually, she is Blessed Teresa now, as she moves closer to sainthood).
I don't doubt for a moment that she struggled with her faith. She beheld so much human tragedy. It was all around her, and helping the people who were sometimes at death's door...it had to have tested her faith in God near to the breaking point.
She was so forthright.
The televangelists you speak of with the bright and cheery demeanor, saying they've spoken to God...they can really do a disservice in a way to those who believe in God but wonder to themselves "why haven't I heard God's voice the way they claim to?"
Wow. Entries (of yours) like these remind me why I still blog here.
Margaret
It's the ones who never doubt that you have to look out for.
The televangelists are always bright and cheery because they preach on Sunday and go to the bank the other days.Just ask Jimmy Swaggert, James Tilton, and Peter Popov.
Mother Teresa lived the life of poverty. The things she asked for were for humanity to give to the poor, help the poor, have mercy on the poor. When she smiled, it wasn't because she just bought her pooch an air conditioned dog house (see Jim Bakker). She smiled because she was a warm and sincere person who loved God and people.
Margaret
Don't knock Jim Bakker. He had a real need for all that money. After all, can you imagine what the cosmetics bills must have been for Tammy Faye's face?
I remember when all that stuff came out about those two(Jim and Tammy Faye). The air conditioned dog house just infuriated me. Trusting people gave to their ministry and this is where the monies ended up. I don't think televangelists were ever viewed in the same way after that debacle.
M
"Wow. Kudos to you, Mr. Riley. That is a great write up. I love Mother Teresa." -- Margaret
Let me second Margaret's remarks. This particular blog post of yours, Reverend Riley, was very good. I, too, love(d) Blessed Mother Theresa.
"My prayer is that [Blessed] Mother Teresa has found the joy that so often seemed just out of reach or a million miles away." -- Reverend Michael Riley
"Actually, she is Blessed Teresa now, as she moves closer to sainthood." -- Margaret
"Of course Jerry Falwell is in heaven. I believe that ..." -- Reverend Michael Riley (See "Jerry Falwell in Heaven" and the remarks made by Rev. Riley on May 16, 2007 on this blog site)
I see. So you are sure that Jerry Falwell is in Heaven but, at the same time, "your prayer" is that Blessed Mother Theresa might be there? Thanks for the laugh. The words "as if" come to mind as I am reminded of one of my 12 year-old nieces favorite expressions of late. "As if" there was much to compare between Mother Theresa and Jerry Falwell.
You can rest assured, Reverend Riley, that when the Catholic Church declares that someone is "blessed," that person IS in Heaven. Christ wasn't joking when he conferred upon His Church ("My Church") -- a single church, the Catholic Church, I might add -- the authority to bind and loosen on both Earth and in Heaven. (cf., Matthew 16:17-19) To Catholics, "blessed" means that the "blessed" person is currently experiencing the Beatic Vision. Once Blessed Mother Theresa is declared a saint, universal public veneration is permitted by the faithful. Whether one is venerated by the universal church (all those on Earth) or not, being in Heaven is about as good as it could possibly get. "My prayer" is that we, one day, are both as lucky as Blessed Mother Theresa is right now.
"As Frederick Buechner once wrote, 'Doubt isn't the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith.'" -- Reverend Michael Riley
With all due respect, I think you are mixing up Buechner with Phillip Tiller. Either way, centuries before either Buechner or Tiller ever existed or dared to write about their faith or their "doubts", St. Augustine, a Catholic giant, wrote in his monumental work, Confessions, that "doubt is but another element of faith."
"Maybe Mother Teresa took some comfort in knowing that Christ felt the same way -- the silence in Gethsemane when he asked for the cup to be taken from him, the cry from the cross, "My God, my God why hast thou forsaken me?'" -- Reverend Michael Riley
I generally make it a rule to avoid speculating as to what the Divine had in mind or felt when He said or did such and such. I find that I get kicked in the ass a lot less often when I adhere to this policy.
That said, and without disagreeing with you, I would respectfully point out that the words, "My God, My God, why hath thou forsaken me?" are the very first words of the 22nd Psalm, the Psalm that is often regarded as "the cry of the innocent."
The Jews gathered around Christ as He hung on the cross may have, in large part, been illiterate, but they knew their Scripture, if for no other reason than from hearing it recited so often in Temple. Precious few would have misunderstood what Chirst meant when He, Divine Himself, asked the question that so often plagues His faithful: "Where are you, God, as I suffer?" Christ, by His example, taught us that He is never closer to us than when we do suffer. In that the 22nd Psalm speaks to the suffering of the Messiah (the nails, His counted [broken] bones and that His tormentors gambled for his coat, etc.), those words are also eerily prophetic, particularly when you consider that David wrote those words centuries before Christ, in His Earthly form, was ever born.
"In the above-quoted letter, she [Blessed Mother Theresa] obviously believes in Jesus and his power... for others. It is her own soul in doubt." -- Reverend Riley
It would be foolish for one to mistake spiritual dryness for "doubt." There is a world of difference between the two. No one, even a saint in the making, would, for decades on end, endure the horrors and the crushing poverty of the slums of Calcutta unless she believed in her (their) heart -- and with every ounce of her being, her spiritual dryness notwithstanding -- the veracity of the words that Christ spoke in Matthew 25:31-46.
"She smiled because she was a warm and sincere person who loved God and people." -- Margaret
Blessed Mother Theresa, pray for those of us who have recourse to you.
The difference I know between the Reverend Jerry Falwell (rest his soul) and Mother Teresa is this. They both did utilize the media, but Mother Teresa was very uncomfortable with the spotlight. It did always seem to shine on her because of her ministry, but once when asked by a panel of people what was the most difficult thing she had to do in her work, she responded "This.", meaning speaking with the media.
I can't say for sure if the Reverend Falwell loved the media, but certainly, he did seem to gravitate toward it with gusto.
Is this a bad thing? I can't say. If both intents were to bring to the world's attention the plight of the needy, and the word of God in their ministry, then that certainly isn't bad.
Mother Teresa was bold in her speech. So was the Reverend Falwell. Pat, since you were doing a comparison thing, I am trying to do the same. There are large parts of Mother Teresa's life we do not know about, but from everything we know, she was a humble person. I am not sure we can say the same about the Reverend Falwell. But we have some saints that have had the quality of arrogance in their pursuit of relaying God's word.
And about the doubt thing. I think people are making a big deal about doubt in faith. Like Mr. Riley said, it's a part of faith. Pat, you call it "spiritual dryness". Whatever it's called, it doesn't mean the end of faith. It's a questioning.
When my parents grew up, they were told NOT to question faith. I think that's unhealthy and can make one stagnant.
Anyway, Mr. Riley's words were beautiful in regard to Mother Teresa, and Jerry Falwell too. Don't hold him to his quotes about where they are in the afterlife.
We'll all know for sure soon enough.:)...(I'm waiting for Ray to say "Or not." :))
Spooky wrote:
"You can rest assured, Reverend Riley, that when the Catholic Church declares that someone is "blessed," that person IS in Heaven."
That would make God irrelevant, wouldn't it?
"Christ wasn't joking when he conferred upon His Church ("My Church")..."
Once again I have to note how lucky you are to have been born into the one true religion.
So with that kind of luck, how come you didn't win the lottery?
Margaret wrote:
"(I'm waiting for Ray to say "Or not." :)) "
Not.
Good enough.
M
For Christ's sake Pat get off your high horse; it's a long fall.
This comment has been removed by the author.
Everything that has to do with religions perse, rules, dogma, is man-made, stress on the man.
Mother Teresa was a wonderful truly good person. Someone to emulate. If we could only have so much love for other people, and sacrifice our own luxuries.
I read some of these comments and find them so hypocritical.
Keep on Michael Edward Riley... I like your blog and I enjoy your writings. Your tongue in cheek approach ( It is tongue in cheek ?) is funny and refreshing
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