Mother Teresa

BLACKHAW SAID:

“Also what is wrong with equating our suffering with the suffering of Christ. That is we can maybe share in the fellowship of his sufferings? Didn't Paul say something like that in Phillipians 3. And while baptism might be a way that we share in his sufferings I think Paul also had in mind the real sufferings we have in this world as we live for Christ.”

She was referring to the Passion of Christ. You know, Calvary and all that good stuff.

In that context, the sufferings of Christ are redemptive. It’s call the Atonement.

Are you claiming that sinners can also make atonement for their sins? In that event, who even needs a divine and sinless Redeemer to atone for our sins if we can atone for our own sins?

“I do not think her going through the dark night of the soul means that she probably was not a Christian.”

i) And I didn’t say otherwise. As a student in grad school, it wouldn’t hurt you to cultivate the habit of reading what people actually write. Try again. I offered an 8-point analysis.

On the first point I offered an interpretation of her experience consistent with her being reprobate.

Then, on points 2-8, I offered an interpretation of her experience consistent with her being a genuine, but genuinely confused Christian. What part of that didn’t you get?

I regard both interpretations as live options—which is why I presented two alternative interpretations.

ii) We’re not talking about a temporary crisis of faith or lapse of faith. In Teresa’s case, this went on for 50 years.

A Christian is, among other things, a believer. He can backslide and be restored, but a Christian cannot be a lifelong unbeliever. I’m merely judging her by her professed lack of a credible profession of faith.

“I think it is part of our Christian pilgrimage as is loneliness. I am married but there is still loneliness. That is just a part of life.”

Which misses the point in a couple of fundamental respects:

i) Single, childless adults are more likely to be lonely that couples with children. She chose a lifestyle that was a recipe for loneliness.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with her choice. But it’s a choice with very predictable emotional consequences.

ii) But instead of placing the obvious, mundane interpretation on her sense of isolation, she placed a theological interpretation on her sense of isolation. This is her dark night of the soul. She is a participant at Calvary. That sort of thing.

There’s no justification for this theological interpretation. Not only is it bad theology, but it’s also bad psychology since the source of her loneliness and emptiness is far more down-to-earth. Her father died when she was eight, and she became a nun. So she suffered from emotional deprivation—to some extent self-imposed.

“So I think one should just be a little more charitable to Mother Theresa wihtout making her a saint above everyone else especially when many did not really even know her at all.”

That would be good and well except for the fact that people are making her into a saint. They are treating her as a spiritual role model, and using her experience to validate Catholic theology. And she, herself, contributed to that interpretation.

ANONYMOUS SAID:
“I'm not a Roman Catholic - in fact, I'm a minister in good standing in a Reformed federation, and a Ph.D. candidate in theology. I'm a Reformed minister and theologian. Yet, this post literally has nauseated me. It is harsh, presumptuous, simplistic, and in my opinion evidences a sad lack of acquaintance with virtue and charity.”

i) How is my post presumptuous? I’m evaluating her experience by her published letters, as well as commentary supplied by her spiritual confessors.

You yourself obviously have a far more favorable evaluation of Mother Teresa. Isn’t that equally presumptuous?

ii) How is my 8-point analysis simplistic? It seems to me that an 8-point analysis is fairly nuanced.

What parts of my 8-point analysis do you take issue with, exactly? If you can’t be more specific, then your own dismissal is pretty simplistic.

iii) You and I define “charity” quite differently. I regard it as uncharitable to promulgate a false and damnable gospel.

“I do not presume to know Mother Teresa's motives or eternal destiny. But I do know that before I would ever attempt to exegete her life and motives in any way, I'd spend the next 40 year of my life picking up my cross, denying myself, and devoting my life to raising the poor from the dust. I'd spend the rest of my life practicing true religion by visiting orphans and widows in their affliction.”

i) If that’s how you really feel, then why don’t you drop out of your PhD program and buy a one-way ticket to Calcutta? Seriously.

ii) Unlike you, I don’t reduce the Good News to the social gospel.

iii) There are also serious questions about how well her ministry provided for the poor and needy. Was the money actually getting to the poor, in terms of quality health care and other material support, or was it sitting in interest-bearing bank accounts while the poor and needy were receiving very substandard care from the Missionaries of Charity?

http://members.lycos.co.uk/bajuu/

http://www.newstatesman.com/200508220019

Or do you content yourself with empty gestures of good will, whether or not they actually do anyone any good?