Spiritual Quote of the Day (St. Teresa of Calcutta, on Silence and Being Alone With God)

“We need silence to be alone with God, to speak to Him, to listen to Him, to ponder His words deep in our hearts. We need to be alone with God in silence to be renewed and transformed. Silence gives us a new outlook on life. In it we are filled with the energy of God himself that makes us do all things with joy.” — St. Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997), Mother Teresa: Essential Writings (2001)

Quote of the Day (Mother Teresa, on the ‘Greatest Disease in the West Today’)

“The greatest disease in the West today is not TB or leprosy; it is being unwanted, unloved, and uncared for. We can cure physical diseases with medicine, but the only cure for loneliness, despair, and hopelessness is love. There are many in the world who are dying for a piece of bread but there are many more dying for a little love. The poverty in the West is a different kind of poverty—it is not only a poverty of loneliness but also of spirituality. There's a hunger for love, as there is a hunger for God.” —Mother Teresa, A Simple Path: Mother Teresa (1995)

Perhaps as much as any individual since Francis of Assisi, Mother Teresa becomes a saint today practically by acclamation. Quotes such as the one above—which testify to her life’s work, even as they continue to inspire others—explain how and why she became “St. Teresa of Calcutta.” (The picture says quite a lot, too.)

Quote of the Day (Mother Teresa, on ‘The Joy of Christ Risen”)

“Never let anything so fill you with sorrow as to make you forget the joy of Christ risen.” —Mother Teresa of Calcutta, No Greater Love, edited by Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos (2002)

Photo of the Day: Mother Teresa, St. Matthew’s Cathedral, Washington DC

I took this photo late in November, when I was spending a few days of vacation in the nation’s capital. This particular shot is from Our Lady’s Chapel in the Cathedral of St. Matthew.

Even though it has been some time since I viewed the set of pictures I took that Friday morning, I identified this picture instantly. This statue of Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta and a homeless man was created by Russian sculptor Leonid Bodnia. In a way, it’s a counterpart to the other image of mercy in this corner of the church: a replica of Michelangelo’s Pieta, sculpted by Felix W. de Weldon. It also honors the tireless advocate of the dispossessed who visited the cathedral back in 1974, five years before she was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace.

Quote of the Day (Mother Teresa, on Spreading Love)

“Spread love everywhere you go; first of all in your house. Give love to your children, to your wife or husband, to a next door neighbor. Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier. Be the living expression of God's kindness; kindness in your face, kindness in your eyes, kindness in your smile.”—Mother Teresa quoted in John Templeton, Worldwide Laws of Life: 200 Eternal Spiritual Principles‎ (1998)

Quote of the Day (Mother Teresa, on “Christ in the Poor That We Meet”)

“The other day I received 15 dollars from a man who has been on his back for twenty years, and the only part that he can move is his right hand. And the only companion that he enjoys is smoking. And he said to me: I do not smoke for one week, and I send you this money. It must have been a terrible sacrifice for him, but see how beautiful, how he shared, and with that money I bought bread and I gave to those who are hungry with a joy on both sides, he was giving and the poor were receiving. This is something that you and I - it is a gift of God to us to be able to share our love with others. And let it be as it was for Jesus. Let us love one another as he loved us. Let us love Him with undivided love. And the joy of loving Him and each other - let us give now - that Christmas is coming so close. Let us keep that joy of loving Jesus in our hearts. And share that joy with all that we come in touch with. And that radiating joy is real, for we have no reason not to be happy because we have no Christ with us. Christ in our hearts, Christ in the poor that we meet, Christ in the smile that we give and the smile that we receive. Let us make that one point: That no child will be unwanted, and also that we meet each other always with a smile, especially when it is difficult to smile.”—Mother Teresa, Nobel Peace Prize Lecture, December 11, 1979

Today marks the centenary of the birth of Mother Teresa, who devoted herself unstintingly to the poorest of the poor in the slums of Calcutta. Her message remains relevant in a broken world: to achieve peace, start at home—not just in local communities, but in the home.

Quote of the Day (Mother Teresa, on Faithfulness)

“God doesn’t call me to be successful. God calls me to be faithful.”—Mother Teresa, when questioned at the end of her life if she felt discouraged that, despite her efforts, poverty remained in Calcutta

(We are living in the age of back to basics, folks, when verities as old as the Scriptures are being relearned through hard and bitter circumstance. I thought we might be seeing some of that after 9/11, when the vogue for businessmen-heroes like Jack Welch turned, for ever so short a time, to selfless people like firefighters. Now, with the economy in the midst of what promises to be a long downturn, people might question again the relative value of success vs. living for others, as Mother Teresa—and maybe at least one or two people in your life, if you’re lucky—did.)