Devotion to the Saints: to ask for a grace with the intercession of Mother Teresa

Saint Teresa of Calcutta, you allowed Jesus' thirsty love on the cross to become a living flame within you, so as to be a light of his love for everyone. Obtain the grace of (express the grace for which you want to pray) from the heart of Jesus.

Teach me to let Jesus penetrate me and take possession of my whole being, so completely, that even my life is an irradiation of his light and his love for others. Amen.

SANTA MADRE TERESA DI CALCUTTA (1910 - 1997 - It is celebrated on September 5th)

When you enter a church or chapel of the Missionaries of Charity, you cannot fail to notice the crucifix above the altar, alongside which is the inscription: "I thirst" ("I thirst"): here is the summary of the life and works of Santa Teresa di Calcutta, canonized on September 4, 2016 by Pope Francis in St. Peter's Square, in the presence of 120 thousand faithful and pilgrims.

Woman of faith, hope, charity, of unspeakable courage, Mother Teresa had a Christocentric and Eucharistic spirituality. He used to say: "I cannot imagine even a moment of my life without Jesus. The greatest reward for me is to love Jesus and serve him in the poor".

This nun, with an Indian habit and Franciscan sandals, extraneous to anyone, believers, non-believers, Catholics, non-Catholics, was appreciated and esteemed in India, where the followers of Christ are the minority.

Born on August 26, 1910 in Skopje (Macedonia) from a wealthy Albanian family, Agnes grew up in a troubled and painful land, where Christians, Muslims, Orthodox lived together; for this reason it was not difficult for her to operate in India, a state with distant traditions of religious tolerance-intolerance, depending on the historical periods. Mother Teresa thus defined her identity: «I am Albanian in blood. I have Indian citizenship. I am a Catholic nun. By vocation I belong to the whole world. In the heart I am totally of Jesus ».

A large part of the Albanian population, of Illyrian origin, despite having suffered from the Ottoman oppression, managed to survive with its traditions and with its deep faith, which has its roots in Saint Paul: «So much so that from Jerusalem and neighboring countries, until to Dalmatia I have fulfilled the mission of preaching the Gospel of Christ "(Rom 15,19:13). Culture, language and literature of Albania resisted thanks to Christianity. However, the ferocity of the communist dictator Enver Hoxha will prohibit, by state decree (November 1967, 268), any religion, immediately destroying XNUMX churches.

Until the advent of the tyrant, Mother Teresa's family lavished charity and common good with full hands. Prayer and Holy Rosary were the glue of the family. Addressing the readers of the magazine "Drita" in June 1979, Mother Teresa said to an increasingly secularized and materialistic western world: "When I think of my mom and dad, it always comes to mind when in the evening we were all together praying. [...] I can only give you one piece of advice: that you return to pray together as soon as possible, because the family that does not pray together cannot live together ».
At 18 Agnes entered the Congregation of the Missionary Sisters of Our Lady of Loreto: she left for Ireland in 1928, a year later she was already in India. In 1931 he made his first vows, taking the new name of Sister Maria Teresa del Bambin Gesù, because she was very devoted to the Carmelite mystic Saint Teresina of Lisieux. Later, like the Carmelite Saint John of the Cross, he will experience the "dark night", when his mystical soul will experience the silence of the Lord.
For about twenty years she taught history and geography to the young women of wealthy families attending the college of the Sisters of Loreto in Entally (eastern Calcutta).

Then came the vocation in the vocation: it was September 10, 1946 when she heard, while traveling by train to a course of spiritual exercises in Darjeeling, the voice of Christ who called her to live among the least of the least. She herself, who wished to live as an authentic bride of Christ, will report the words of the "Voice" in her correspondence with her superiors: "I want Indian Missionary Sisters of Charity, who are my fire of love among the poorest, the sick, the dying, the street children. They are the poor you have to lead to Me, and the sisters who offered their lives as victims of My love would bring these souls to Me ».

It leaves, not without difficulty, the prestigious convent after almost twenty years of permanence and alone it sets off, with a white sari (color of mourning in India) edged with blue (Marian color), for the slums of Calcutta in search of the forgotten , of the pariahs, of the dying, who comes to collect, surrounded by mice, even in the sewers. Gradually some of her past pupils and other girls join together, to then reach the diocesan recognition of her congregation: 7 October 1950. And while, year after year, the Institute of the Sisters of Charity grows all over the world, the Bojaxhiu family is expropriated of all its assets by the government of Hoxha, and, realy of its religious belief, is harshly persecuted. Mother Teresa will say, who will be forbidden to see her loved ones again: "Suffering helps us unite ourselves to the Lord, to his sufferings" in a redemptive action.

Touching and strong words he will use in reference to the value of the family, the first environment, in the contemporary age, of poverty: «Sometimes we should ask ourselves some questions in order to better direct our actions [...] I know first of all, the poor of my family , of my house, those who live near me: people who are poor, but not for lack of bread? ».

The "little pencil of God", to use its self-definition, has repeatedly intervened publicly and forcefully, even in front of politicians and statesmen on the condemnation of abortion and artificial methods of contraception. He "made his voice heard by the powerful of the earth," said Pope Francis in the homily of the canonization. How can we not remember, then, the memorable speech he gave at the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize on 17 October 1979 in Oslo? Claiming to accept the Award exclusively on behalf of the poor, he surprised everyone by the harsh attack on abortion, which he presented as the main threat to world peace.

His words resonate more current than ever: «I feel that today the greatest destroyer of peace is abortion, because it is a direct war, a direct killing, a direct murder by the hand of the mother herself (...). Because if a mother can kill her own child, there is nothing more that prevents me from killing you and you from killing me. " He claimed that the life of the unborn child is a gift from God, the greatest gift that God can give to the family. "Today there are many countries that allow abortion, sterilization and other means to avoid or destroy life since his Start. This is an obvious sign that these countries are the poorest of the poor, since they do not have the courage to accept even one more life. The life of the unborn child, like the life of the poor that we find on the streets of Calcutta, Rome or other parts of the world, the life of children and adults is always the same life. It's our life. It is the gift that comes from God. […] Every existence is the life of God in us. Even the unborn child has the divine life in itself ». Still at the Nobel Prize ceremony, the question asked: "What can we do to promote world peace?", She replied without hesitation: "Go home and love your families."

He fell asleep in the Lord on September 5 (day of his liturgical memory) 1997 with a rosary in his hands. This "drop of clean water", this inseparable Martha and Mary, bequeathed a pair of sandals, two saris, a canvas bag, two to three notebooks of notes, a prayer book, a rosary, a golf of wool and ... a spiritual mine of inestimable value, to which to draw profusion in these confused days of ours, often forgetting the presence of God.