Mother Teresa’s “Crisis of Faith”
You have most likely read about David van Biema’s story “Mother Teresa’s Crisis of Faith,” which appeared on the cover of this week’s TIME Magazine. Biema’s article is based on the findings disclosed in Brian Kolodiejchuk’s new book, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light, which publishes letters written my Mother Teresa (Wikipedia) never before made public.
Here is a statement that represents well the inner struggles and doubts that she experienced:
Jesus has a very special love for you. As for me, the silence and the emptiness is so great that I look and do not see, listen and do not hear. —Mother Teresa to the Rev. Michael Van Der Peet, September 1979
This article has spurred discussion is several different directions.
Atheist Christopher Hitchens sees Mother Teresa as representative of all honest theists:
“She was no more exempt from the realization that religion is a human fabrication than any other person, and that her attempted cure was more and more professions of faith could only have deepened the pit that she had dug for herself.”
Rick Phillips notes how the Roman Catholic Church, rather than trying to suppress what might appear to be an embarrassment, quickly publicized Mother Teresa’s doubts. He very insightfully reflects on this curiosity, suggesting that Mother Teresa’s restless soul was the result of her mysticism.
She seems to present a classic instance of the mystical way, and her tortured darkness offers a dire warning of the perils of this approach to God.
. . .
The first is that instead of offering a primer on the despair of works-righteousness, she really offers a primer on the perils of mystical, ecstatic Christianity. . . . Why was her faith so dry and dead, as she lamented for over sixty years? One key answer seems to be that her faith was not rooted in the Word of God, but in experiential ecstasy. In this, parallels can be seen between Mother Teresa and Christians of many stripes—many of them evangelicals—whose faith is driven by spiritual experiences instead of by the truth of God’s Word. How much of the frantic, sterile restlessness of the evangelical culture today is charged by this same drive.
Al Mohler likewise offers his commentary, suggesting that the key lesson to be learned is that “our faith is in Christ—not in our feelings.”
The Christian Gospel is the good news that God saves sinners through the atonement accomplished by Jesus Christ—his cross and resurrection. Salvation comes to those who believe in Christ—it is by grace we are saved through faith. But the faith that saves is not faith in faith, nor faith in our ability maintain faith, but faith in Christ. Our confidence is in Christ, not in ourselves.
There is a sweet and genuine emotional aspect to the Christian faith, and God made us emotional and feeling creatures. But we cannot trust our feelings. Our faith is not anchored in our feelings, but in the facts of the Gospel.
. . .
Our confidence is in Christ, not in ourselves. We are weak; He is strong. We fluctuate; He is constant. We cannot trust our feelings nor our emotional state. We trust in Christ. Those who come to Christ by faith are not kept unto him by our faith, but by his faithfulness.
According to Vatican, this will not negatively influence Mother Teresa’s chance at sainthood.
The Catholic Association of Bengal, the largest lay organisation in Calcutta, has mounted a constant prayer for the last two weeks to push her cause forward at Rome. It has also nominated 2007 as the ‘Year of Mother Teresa’s Sainthood’, since Sept 5 will mark her 10th death anniversary.
Here’s the coverage:
- David Van Biema: “Mother Teresa’s Crisis of Faith”
- Christopher Hitchens at Slate: Mommie Dearest: The pope beatifies Mother Teresa, a fanatic, a fundamentalist, and a fraud
- Susan Jacoby at On Faith: Road to Sainthood Paved with Good Publicity
- James Martin at NYTimes: A Saint’s Dark Night
- Albert Mohler:
- Rick Phillips: Mother Teresa’s Redemption
.
0 Responses to “Mother Teresa's "Crisis of Faith"”
Leave a Response