Is it true that Mother Theresa was an etheist ?

Question

Did you guys hear about the new book that's coming out with a collection of letter Mother Theresa wrote over the past 50 years?

I read some previews in Time magazine, they had an advance copy of the book.

Turns out, Mother Theresa didn't really believe in God or prayer or any of that other stuff.

In the letters to her confidant, she often wrote about the darkness in her heart and mind, the total lack of any sense that there's a God out there, she referred to Jesus as the "Absent One" because she never felt his presence, she felt that her quest for souls was a waste of time, that heaven was a lie, that she was a hypocrite for talking about faith and God in public, and her letters revealed that she hadn't prayed in years because she felt it was a pointless waste of time.

Answer 1

Perhaps this article will answer your Question -

_Gregory Rodriguez _

The recent posthumous publication of Mother Teresa's private letters has sparked a debate on the nature of saintliness and, by extension, what it means to be good.

The letters, which she had asked to be destroyed, reveal a complex woman who was tormented by her faith and suffered long periods of religious doubt and spiritual emptiness.

Two years after her death in 1997, a Gallup Poll asked Americans to name the people they most admired from the 20th century. Not surprisingly, Mother Teresa, who dedicated her life to serving the poorest of the poor, topped the list. But that was before anyone except her confessors knew of her inner turmoil.

In public she betrayed no signs of her affliction. Her many admirers no doubt revered her, not only for her selflessness but for the unquestioning faith they believed inspired her. Will they now consider her a hypocrite?

The self-described "anti-theist" Christopher Hitchens, who wrote a book critical of Mother Teresa, has seized on the newly published letters as proof that the celebrated nun knew - but could not admit - that there is no God.

For his part, Father James Martin, a Jesuit priest, told Time that he thought the letters would broaden Mother Teresa's appeal as a religious figure because millions would be able to identify with her feelings that God had abandoned her. "And who would have thought that the one thought to be the most ardent of believers could be a saint to the sceptics?" he asked.

In a time when the notion of goodness has been thoroughly watered down, as politeness is mistaken for kindness, certainty passes for faith, ethics for spirituality and middle-class mores for saintliness, it is good to be reminded that those whom many consider saints are complex human beings who more often than not defy convention.

A decade ago I met a 74-year-old nun in Romania who taught me the difference between manners and social goodness - and the real thing.

Sister Mary Rose Christy was the closest thing to a saint I have ever met. But it is not because she was particularly kind to me. Nor did she play the role of the docile holy woman content to radiate light from the corner of the room.

"Sister Mary Rose was purposeful, committed and directed," a friend reminded me the other day, "and she would walk all over someone if she thought they were keeping her from getting something done."

In 1990, while living in Arizona, Sister Mary Rose was watching CNN when a story on orphanages appeared. The conditions she saw were so awful that she started screaming at the television.

Not long after that, she moved to the 12th-century Transylvanian town of Sibiu, where she worked at an orphanage for severely handicapped children for four years. She also set up a non-profit organisation called the Romanian-American Association for the Promotion of Health, Education and Human Services to help strengthen families so parents could better care for their children.

Brusque, opinionated, hard-headed and not the best listener I have ever met, Sister Mary Rose had an agenda, and I think she viewed mere mortals like myself who crossed her path as people who could either help or hinder her mission. She figured that I could help her get the word out about the plight of children and families in her adopted country and town. She put me up for a few days in a spare apartment and let me talk with her at length. But it was not until her driver took us to Riul Vadalui, the orphanage where she had worked, that I began to understand her amazing gift.

As soon as we parked, our car was surrounded by children wanting to touch Sister Mary Rose. Some chanted her name; all appeared terribly pleased to see her. She smiled, touched and kissed them.

Inside the facility were other children she tended; many were confined to their beds and some had deformities the sight of which - I'm ashamed to say - made me recoil. Sister Mary Rose had the opposite reaction. She would sit down and hold them, sometimes kissing them on the lips.

Sister Mary Rose never told me that it was her faith in God that gave her the capacity to love these children so fully. For all I know, she might have shared Mother Teresa's doubts. And, considering the tragedies these women saw daily, who could blame them?

But I do suspect that, whether they sensed God's presence or not, it was both women's will to believe, no matter how difficult, in the existence of an ultimate source of goodness that drove them to love so deeply those whom others had abandoned.

I tried to call Sister Mary Rose at the Sisters of Mercy residence in Burlingame, California, where she lives. I wondered what she would make of the Mother Teresa story. But I was told that she was too frail to talk.

I'm pretty sure I know the answer: the dark night of the soul is no reason not to act as if the good can outweigh the bad. By the way, her organisation in Romania flourishes.

Los Angeles Times.

Answer 2

Certainly not, it is true she had times in her life,very difficult times that left her with doubts but these were really self doubts, a lot of the Saints experienced this too in life.
The media is very quick to pick up on things like this and twist the facts to make a sensational story, Mother Theresa was not perfect and was given to human frailty like the rest of us.
There is however a phenomon that is refered to in theology called `` the dark night of the soul` and again quite a few of the saints experienced this,do a search on this it makes very interesting reading.

Answer 3

These letters do not show her as being an atheist. They show that she struggled with the work that she was doing, and often felt out of touch with God. This is something that anyone working their entire life for the Lord will experience. To think that she was an atheist is unfounded and ridiculous.

Answer 4

She had a crisis with feeling God's presense, but I don't think she was an athiest.

I think it's unfair how you're adding things she never said. She never said she didn't believe in God. Just that she didn't feel his presense. That's different. That would make me feel like a hypocrit too.

Answer 5

She was a closet atheist, which means she had her doubts. Remember this woman saw alot and went through alot. She helped many suffering, poor people. I don't care what she beleived she did wonderful things, she had her right to believe whatever she wanted, as we all do.

Answer 6

Sometimes it is true, sometimes it it false. Not all mothers wear flannel pj's or yoga pants.

Answer 7

These letters does not say that she didn't believe in God, but she had doubts in her mind..It can be said that her faith was weak. Obviously whoever is made to believe in trinity, its natural to happen to them. But she was brave enough to confess whereas most chrsitians would never agree.

Answer 8

a sadist yes, an athiest no.

she let people with curable illnesses and pain that could have been alleviated sit and rot and suffer becuase she thought that pain brings one closer to god.

I wouldn't be surprised if one day we find her leather s+m suit and whip that she used to "indoctrinate" the young nuns and straight priests with.

Answer 9

Mother Teresa lived the Gospel

He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
Then the king will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.' Then the righteous will answer him and say, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?' And the king will say to them in reply, 'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.' Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you accursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, a stranger and you gave me no welcome, naked and you gave me no clothing, ill and in prison, and you did not care for me.' Then they will answer and say, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or ill or in prison, and not minister to your needs?' He will answer them, 'Amen, I say to you, what you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do for me.' And these will go off to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."
Matthew 25:33-46

Answer 10

No, she had doubts at one time.