Mother Teresa; Come Be My Light - The Private Writings of the Saint of Calcutta, Brian Kolodiejchuk
I heard, after the death of Mother Teresa, that she had not felt the presence of The Lord in her life for years. Since around 1949, she writes about a darkness, saying "the place of God in my soul is blank, there is no God in me." She died in 1997. For over 45 years she toiled with the poorest of the poor in the name of a God who she could no longer feel. But her faith, her devotion to Him kept her going beyond her own pain.
I've wanted to read her letters & gain some inspiration about perservering through the darkness. Then I started reading the book. Sometime around 1956 Mother Teresa started asking her superiors in the church for her private writings back. Literally begging for her letters to be destroyed, or be returned to her so she could destroy them. Again & again for over 40 years she asked for her private writings to never be made public. She felt her call by God was a "delicate gift" & did not want that publicized. Each & every time the higher ups in the Catholic church denied her request.
After reading the first several of her letters, expressing her pain and longing to feel Jesus Christ in her life, I was amazed. However, after reading several of her letters pleading & begging that the writings never be made public, I could not keep reading. The Catholic Church may be willing to put her writings out there against her wishes, I can't control that, but I can choose not to read the book. For me it honestly felt like an invasion of privacy.
Shortly after her death she was fast-tracked for sainthood by the Catholic Church. She was beatified (the first step towards sainthood) in 2003.
How interesting. She is a person I really admire. I do think if she did not want her letters shared, people should respect that, but at the same time, I think they would be such inspiring reading.
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