"Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin."
What the world was like
Mother Teresa of Calcutta was born in a city called Skopje, located in Macedonia, in the Balkan Peninsula in southeastern Europe. At the time of Mother Teresa's birth, Macedonia was part of the Ottoman Empire. When she was a child, this area was torn by the Balkan Wars. In 1918, after the First World War, Macedonia became part of a new nation called the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. In 1929 that nation changed its name to Yugoslavia. In 1991, after World War II and the rise and fall of Communism in Eastern Europe, the Republic of Macedonia declared its independence from Yugoslavia, and Skopje became its capital.
Mother Teresa arrived in India in 1929. India was part of the British Empire and was ruled by England. In 1947, India gained its independence thanks to the work of Mohandas Gandhi and others. India was then divided into two nations, India and Pakistan. In 1971 East Pakistan became the independent nation of Bangladesh. Today the nation of India is the world's largest liberal democracy.
Who she was
Teresa was the daughter of Nikola and Dronda Bojaxhiu. Her parents named her Gonxha, or Agnes. Teresa was the youngest child in a loving Catholic family. She had an older sister named Aga and a brother named Lazar. Agnes's father died suddenly when Agnes was just seven years old. Her mother had to raise her children alone. When Agnes was twelve she realized God was calling her to become a missionary. She read all the stories she could find about the work of Catholic missionaries around the world. And she studied geography to learn about the lands where missionaries worked.
When Agnes was eighteen years old, she joined the Sisters of Loreto. The Sisters of Loreto are a community of Irish sisters who did missionary work in India. She traveled first to Ireland, where she began her studies. Then she was sent to India in 1929. There she took her first vows as a sister. She chose Teresa as her religious name in honor of Saint Teresa of Ávila and Saint Thérèse of Lisieux.
From the time she first arrived in India until 1948, Mother Teresa was a teacher. She taught at Saint Mary's High School in Calcutta. Many of the students at the school were girls from wealthy families. But the city of Calcutta was very large, and many people who lived there were very poor. Day after day, Mother Teresa saw the difficult lives of Calcutta's poor people. She wanted to help these poor people to live better lives.
In 1948 Pope Pius XII and Teresa's order allowed her to leave Saint Mary's and devote her life to caring for the homeless people on the streets of Calcutta. Teresa studied nursing so that she would be able to help the sick. She opened a school for Calcutta's poorest children. She stopped wearing the religious habit of the Sisters of Loreto. Instead she wore the clothes of a poor Indian woman: a plain cotton sari and sandals.
As word of Mother Teresa's new mission spread, volunteers -- young women from India and around the world -- arrived to help her in her work. Then, in 1950, the Church gave Mother Teresa permission to start a new order of religious sisters, the Missionaries of Charity. Their mission is to love and serve the poor, especially those who have no one else to care for them.
During her long life among the poor, Mother Teresa received many honors. One of these was the Nobel Peace Prize, which she received in 1979. When she died, her adopted country of India gave her a state funeral. The ceremonies were broadcast on television around the world. In 2003, only six years after her death, Mother Teresa was declared Blessed by Pope John Paul II.
What this saint means to us
Today the Missionaries of Charity serve the poorest of the poor in countries around the world, from the streets of India to the streets of New York. And, as Mother Teresa reminded us, with yesterday gone and tomorrow not yet here, we have only today to reach out and help those who need it most. So let us begin.
