Pope Francis has cleared the way for sainthood by approving a decree recognising a second miracle attributed to her intercession with God – a necessary event for such a move in the church. One before a deceased Catholic can be declared “blessed”, and another such miracle, occurring after that declaration, before he or she can be canonized as a saint.
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Mother Teresa, celebrated for her work with the poor in the Indian city of Kolkata, is expected to be canonised as part of the pope’s Jubilee year of mercy.
Born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu on August 26, 1910, in Skopje, Macedonia, Mother Teresa joined the Loreto order of nuns in 1928.
Mother founded the Missionaries of Charity and spent 45-years serving the poor, sick, orphaned and dying on the streets of Kolkata.
On Thursday, Pope Francis formally recognized a second miracle allegedly performed by Mother Teresa.
Francis has often bypassed the usual norms to declare someone a saint, which means that the church officially declares that someone is in heaven and worthy of veneration as a model of sanctity by the faithful on Earth. En route she said that God told her to leave the convent and live among the poor.
The nun, who died in 1997 at the age of 87, became an worldwide icon but has also been criticised for trying to convert people to Christianity.
Damian said plans for a celebration in the parish have yet to be formalized, but he hopes it will be a grand occasion. “Now there is a case in Brazil where one person has been healed miraculously as a result of her earlier prayers”, Sunita Kumar said, adding that such miracles were known to happen even after the death of a saint. She was beatified as Blessed Teresa of Calcutta by Pope John Paul II in 2003.
She was sometimes criticized for trying to convert people to Christianity and mismanaging a huge donation.
Pope Francis wishes to complete the sainthood during the Catholic Church’s current Holy Year as he has always been seen as a leader with a great concern for the poor. In 1946, while traveling by train from Calcutta to Darjeeling, she was inspired to found the Missionaries of Charity order. Here’s how she once described herself: “By blood, I am Albanian”.
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Mother Teresa had her critics, as in the Australian feminist Germaine Greer who accused her of foisting Catholicism on the vulnerable.
