"Three of Mother Teresa's teachings that are fundamental to her religious congregation are all the more dangerous because they are believed so sincerely by her sisters.

Most basic is the belief that as long as a sister obeys she is doing God's will.

Another is the belief that the sisters have leverage over God by choosing to suffer. Their suffering makes God very happy. He then dispenses more graces to humanity.

The third is the belief that a[b]ny attachment to human beings, even the poor being served, supposedly interferes with love of God and must be vigilantly avoided or immediately uprooted[/b].

The efforts to prevent any attachments cause continual chaos and confusion, movement and change in the congregation. Mother Teresa did not invent these beliefs - they were prevalent in religious congregations before Vatican II - but she did everything in her power (which was great) to enforce them."

– Susan Shields, former sister with Missionaries of Charity.

Dulcet7:


Here is an article I found about the Mother Theresa you may have never heard about.

Please respect the thread and keep insults out of the way.

If you disagree with anything here just provide your reasons and if possible, reference or evidence for it.

- contents here were snipped -

Journalists have estimated the Missionaries of Charity receive as much as US$100 million a year, although no accounts are published.

Some maintain that the money is transferred to the Istituto per Opere Religiosi (the Vatican Bank),

where it is diverted into non-Christian countries for "missionary work" – more nunneries and convents.

A 1991 audit of the UK operation revealed that only 7% of the total income of about US$2.6 million went into charity work.

The rest was remitted to the Vatican Bank.

- contents here were snipped -

Dulcet7:


"Three of Mother Teresa's teachings that are fundamental to her religious congregation are all the more dangerous because they are believed so sincerely by her sisters.

Most basic is the belief that as long as a sister obeys she is doing God's will.

Another is the belief that the sisters have leverage over God by choosing to suffer. Their suffering makes God very happy. He then dispenses more graces to humanity.

The third is the belief that any attachment to human beings, even the poor being served, supposedly interferes with love of God and must be vigilantly avoided or immediately uprooted.

The efforts to prevent any attachments cause continual chaos and confusion, movement and change in the congregation.

Mother Teresa did not invent these beliefs - they were prevalent in religious congregations before Vatican II - but she did everything in her power (which was great) to enforce them."

– Susan Shields, former sister with Missionaries of Charity.

By the 1970s, she was internationally famed as a humanitarian and advocate for the poor and helpless, due in part to a documentary and book Something Beautiful for God by Malcolm Muggeridge.

She has also been criticized for her view on suffering. She felt that suffering would bring people closer to Jesus.[43] Sanal Edamaruku, President of Rationalist International , criticised the failure to give pain killers, writing that in her Homes for the Dying, one could “hear the screams of people having maggots tweezered from their open wounds without pain relief. On principle, strong painkillers are even in hard cases not given. According to Mother Teresa's bizarre philosophy, it is ‘the most beautiful gift for a person that he can participate in the sufferings of Christ’.”[44]

The quality of care offered to terminally ill patients in the Homes for the Dying has been criticised in the medical press. The Lancet and the British Medical Journal reported the reuse of hypodermic needles, poor living conditions, including the use of cold baths for all patients, and an approach to illness and suffering that precluded the use of many elements of modern medical care, such as systematic diagnosis.[45] Dr. Robin Fox, editor of The Lancet, described the medical care as "haphazard", as volunteers without medical knowledge had to take decisions about patient care, because of the lack of doctors. He observed that her order did not distinguish between curable and incurable patients, so that people who could otherwise survive would be at risk of dying from infections and lack of treatment.[46]

Colette Livermore, a former Missionary of Charity, describes her reasons for leaving the order in her book Hope Endures: Leaving Mother Teresa, Losing Faith, and Searching for Meaning. Livermore found what she called Mother Teresa's "theology of suffering" to be flawed, despite being a good and courageous person. Though Mother Teresa instructed her followers on the importance of spreading the Gospel through actions rather than theological lessons, Livermore could not reconcile this with some of the practices of the organization. Examples she gives include unnecessarily refusing to help the needy when they approached the nuns at the wrong time according to the prescribed schedule, discouraging nuns from seeking medical training to deal with the illnesses they encountered (with the justification that God empowers the weak and ignorant), and imposition of "unjust" punishments, such as being transferred away from friends. Livermore says that the Missionaries of Charity "infantilized" its nuns by prohibiting the reading of secular books and newspapers, and emphasizing obedience over independent thinking and problem-solving.[47]

The spending of the charity money received has been criticized by some. Christopher Hitchens and the German magazine Stern have said Mother Teresa did not focus donated money on alleviating poverty or improving the conditions of her hospices, but on opening new convents and increasing missionary work.[55]

Additionally, the sources of some donations accepted have been criticized. Mother Teresa accepted donations from the autocratic and corrupt Duvalier family in Haiti and openly praised them. She also accepted 1.4 million dollars from Charles Keating, involved in the fraud and corruption scheme known as the Keating Five scandal and supported him before and after his arrest. The Deputy District Attorney for Los Angeles, Paul Turley, wrote to Mother Teresa asking her to return the donated money to the people Keating had stolen from, one of whom was "a poor carpenter". The donated money was not accounted for, and Turley did not receive a reply.[56]

chukwudi44:

@dulcet 7

Was  that the only thing you saw on her wikipedia page,why did you restrict your self only to the criticisms she received  from a few individuals without even bothering to as certain their veracity.What about the praises and honours she received virtually all over the world why did you fail to mention it.

Mother theresa whether you like it or not remains the greatest christian of the last 100 yeras

Following Teresa's death in 1997, the Holy See began the process of beatification, the first step towards possible canonisation, or sainthood. This process requires the documentation of a miracle. In 2002, the Vatican recognised as a miracle the healing of a tumour in the abdomen of an Indian woman, Monica Besra, following the application of a locket containing Teresa's picture.

This purported miracle attracted considerable controversy. Besra's husband reportedly said that the lump in his wife's adomen was not cured by divine intervention, but by hospital treatment. According to a report in Time magazine, records of her treatment were removed by a member of Mother Teresa's order. The Balurghat Hospital where Besra was treated reported coming under pressure from the missionaries to acknowledge that the healing process was the result of a miracle.

It is ridiculous for anyone to say mother theresa embezzled funds donated to charity where are the proofs ?Mother theresa sacrificed vitually all she had to feed the less privilege,what more do you expect from her?

JeSoul:

This is very interesting.

My knowedge of Mama Theresa is a shade lighter than pedestrian and pop culture has her depicted as the saint we should all aspire to be. It appears we have been sheltered from knowing crucial facts. Again, this is very interesting. If that was indeed her view on suffering - denying pain relief to the sick under the insistence that it brings one closer to Christ - then  Misusing donations? openly supporting corrupt leaders?

Are there any who'd like to speak in favor of the defense?

“ Then there was her business dealings. How did she come to hear of Charles Keating, chairman of the Lincoln savings and Loan Company, now in jail for the biggest fraud in American history? In return for half a million dollars and the use of Keating private jet, Mother Teresa showered blessings on this gentleman and gave him a personal crucifix which he used as they say to enhance his credibility.”

The judge who presided the trial was the later notorious Judge Lance Ito (remember the O.J. Simpson trial) During the course of the trial, Teresa wrote to the court seeking clemency for Keating. In his capacity as Deputy District attorney for Los Angeles, Mr. Paul Turley wrote back to Mother. Here is à brief excerpt of his letter,

“Mr. Keating was convicted of defrauding 17 individuals of more then $900,000. These 17 persons were representative of 17,000 individuals from whom Mr. Keating stole $252,000,000. You urge Judge Ito to look into his heart—as he sentenced Charles Keating—and do what Jesus would do. I submit the same challenge to you…I submit that Jesus would promptly and unhesitatingly return the stolen property to its rightful owners.”

Three years later, Mr. Turley had yet to receive a reply from Teresa.

Keating gave Mother Teresa one and a quarter million dollars. It does not matter to Hitchens that all of the money was spent before anyone ever knew of his shenanigans. What matters is that Mother Teresa gave to the poor a lot of money taken from a rich guy who later went to jail. But her biggest crime, according to Hitchens, was writing a letter to Judge Lance Ito (yeah, the same one) "seeking clemency for Mr. Keating."

It would be rather audacious of Mother Teresa if she were to intervene in a trial "seeking clemency" for the accused, unless, of course, she had evidence that the accused was innocent. But she did nothing of the kind: what she wrote to Judge Ito was a reference letter, not a missive "seeking clemency."

"I do not know anything about Mr. Charles Keating's work," Mother Teresa said, "or his business or the matters you are dealing with." She then explains her letter by saying "Mr. Keating has done much to help the poor, which is why I am writing to you on his behalf."

Deep Sight:

Dulcet, what is your view of Mahatma Ghandi?

Dulcet7:

Hello Deep Sight. To me, Gandhi is not really too different from Adolf Hitler at the core of their hearts, although the extents of their outward actions and reactions differed somewhat. I think he was an [i]exemplary [/i]leader who stood and fought for only his own people.

Deep Sight:

1. Please can you very sincerely tell me if there is something wrong with spending one's lifetime fighting for one's people?

Deep Sight:

2. Do you really think your comparison of Ghandi to Hitler is sustainable?

Deep Sight:

3. Do you believe in reincarnation?

Deep Sight:

4. What is your view of dreams, visions and clairvoyance?

Deep Sight:

5. What is your view of Deism?
Thanks.

As at Wardha,
C. P.,
23-7-'39

Dear friend,

Friends have been urging me to write to you for the sake of humanity. But I have resisted their request, because of the feeling that any letter from me would be an impertinence. Something tells me that I must not calculate and that I must make my appeal for whatever it may be worth.

It is quite clear that you are today the one person in the world who can prevent a war which may reduce humanity to a savage state. Must you pay that price for an object however worthy it may appear to you to be? Will you listen to the appeal of one who has deliberately shunned the method of war not without considerable success? Any way I anticipate your forgiveness, if I have erred in writing to you.

I remain,

Your sincere friend

M. K. Gandhi

HERR HITLER
BERLIN
GERMANY.

For example, I would like to say something about Mahatma Gandhi. It was an everyday affair in his ashram that some disciple failed him, because what he was asking of those poor people was so unnatural, so devoid of any reason and sense, that unless they were absolute idiots they were going to fail him. That was the only way to save themselves, otherwise they would be destroyed by him. In Mahatma Gandhi's ashram you could not drink tea. That was enough to fail him. Now, tea is such an innocent thing. Buddhist monks have used it for thousands of years as a help to meditation because it keeps you alert, awake. When you are feeling sleepy, just a cup of tea brings you a little awareness.

The story is that Bodhidharma was determined to remain awake for twenty-four hours. But the body is the body, the eyelids get tired, and when they get tired the eyes close. He became so angry that he cut off his eyelids and threw them in the grass. Then his eyes could not be closed. It is a symbolic story. It did not happen, it cannot happen -- because I know Bodhidharma perfectly well, He is the last person to do such a thing. But the story is significant, although it is just a story: those eyelids grew into a plant that became the tea plant. And because those were the eyelids of a man like Bodhidharma, the tea still carries the quality of awareness. That is the significance of the story.

In every Buddhist monastery, the first thing is the tea. But in Gandhi's ashram, if somebody was caught drinking tea it was a great sin: he has failed the master. And the master was a sado-masochist. All disciplinarians, whether they are mahatmas, sages, rabbis, saints, principals, teachers, headmasters -- all disciplinarians are, deep down, dictatorial.

Discipline is a beautiful name for an ugly thing: dictatorship. But you cannot revolt against a disciplinarian. You can revolt against a dictator. You can revolt against Stalin, you can revolt against Mussolini, but you cannot revolt against Mahatma Gandhi, and there is the danger.

Why can't you revolt against Mahatma Gandhi? -- because before he disciplines you, he tortures himself. He is a sado-masochist. Before he tortures you, he tortures himself more than he is asking you to. You cannot revolt. This man is not simply torturing you like Joseph Stalin. He has tortured himself, he has disciplined himself, far deeper than he is asking you. How can you revolt against him? You cannot find any excuse.

Gandhi had one ashram in South Africa, in the beginning of his career of mahatmahood. The ashram was called the Phoenix Ashram. There, he tortured his wife and his children so immensely that I wonder why nobody bothers and nobody thinks about it. And people like Richard Attenborough make films on Gandhi, and all that is essential, all that should be brought to the eyes of the people, is completely left out. Perhaps these people like Attenborough are blind completely -- blinded by his mahatmahood.

What was he doing to his wife? First, she had to clean the toilet, and you don't know the Indian toilet. Don't compare it with the Western toilet. The Western toilet can be cleaned, there is no problem. There is nothing to clean, it is already clean. But the Indian toilet is really dirty. And Kasturba, Gandhi's wife, could not say no either, because Gandhi himself was cleaning. When the husband is cleaning, she knew that he was a mahatma. She knew that it was a dirty job and she did not feel like cleaning other people's dirt and carrying it out from the outhouse, way back, and throwing all the shit into a ditch -- because Gandhi had this idea that the shit should not be misused. Everything had to be used.

He was really a miser. There is no question about why he suffered from constipation -- his whole life he was carrying the enema with him everywhere -- it was his psychology. The shit had to be collected and thrown into a ditch behind the house, and then mud had to be thrown over it, so it becomes manure for the next year's crops.

Now, for Kasturba it was so difficult. And the way it has to be carried in India, you cannot believe. But in India, they have reduced one fourth of the country to such a state that they are not allowed to do any other work. So only this work is available, they have to do it. They are born to do it; that is their destiny. So they collect the shit in buckets, and carry it on their heads for miles. In India, Kasturba had never thought that she would have to do this, because she belonged to a higher caste; she was not a sudra, an untouchable.

But Gandhi was carrying it himself, and he was the mahatma. And when he carries it he gets a subtle right over you. You have to understand the subtle power politics in such small things. Because he gets up at three o'clock in the morning, everybody has to get up at three o'clock in the morning. And when the old man is getting up at three o'clock: you are young, you will feel guilty if you don't get up. And if you are caught, then you have failed the master. And what is the master going to do? He will not punish you, he will punish himself -- because he had this egoistic idea that if he is truly pure then nothing can go wrong around him, then everything is going to be right. If anything goes wrong, that simply means something is impure in him, so he has to purify himself by fasting.

So if you fail him, he will torture himself. That will create even more of a burden on you. First: guilt that you failed him. Second: guilt that now he is suffering because of your stupidity -- you could have awakened at three o'clock, it was not such a big deal. And now for a few days, nobody knows. . . because he would always start a "fast unto death." Although he never fasted unto death he would always start a fast unto death.

Then Gandhi had to be persuaded; then all the leaders of the country had to run to his ashram and say to him, "Just for one man's failure you cannot punish the whole country." Then after two or three days he would be ready to take food, and that one man would be condemned by the whole country. He had been punished more than you could have imagined. Wherever he went, people would talk about him: "This is the man for whom Gandhi is fasting unto death." And if Gandhi died, they would have killed this man, they would not have left this man alive.

One night Gandhi threw Kasturba, who was pregnant, out of the house because she was reluctant to clean the latrine. A pregnant woman, a woman who does not know any other language, in a foreign country, absolutely dependent on him -- he closed the door, threw her out, and said, "If you don't clean the latrine, then this is not your house, then you don't belong to me. If you cannot follow my discipline, if my own wife fails me, then who else is going to listen to me? In the cold winter Kasturba wept outside and finally decided that she should agree to clean the latrine. Only when she agreed to clean the latrine was she allowed in. Now, you can fail such a man very easily by anything, just by smoking a cigarette, drinking a cup of tea, anything.

[b]He did not allow his children to be educated. He didn't send them to school. They wanted to go, their mother wanted it also. [/b]Naturally she wanted them to be educated, "otherwise who is going to feed them? And their whole life is ahead of them. You are educated, you are a barrister, you earn. And you are a mahatma -- even if you don't earn, you have thousands of worshippers. But your children -- don't you send them even to the primary school?"

He was against the education that is available in the schools, colleges and the universities. Why? -- because it creates doubt, it destroys people's faith; because it teaches people science and technology, which he was against: against things so simple and so essential that you will not be able to believe it -- that in the twentieth century a man can be against the telephone!

Now, the telephone does not do any harm to anybody. One can be against nuclear weapons, I can understand -- but the telephone?, railway lines?, trains?, airplanes? He was against anything except the spinning wheel -- that was the only technology that he accepted. Beyond that, all technology was evil, all science was evil; so why send your children to learn the devilish ways of science, technology, logic, philosophy, and destroy their faith, their belief in God? No. He would not send them.

His eldest son, Haridas, escaped. Seeing the situation -- "This man is going to destroy our lives completely" -- he escaped, reached a relative's family and told the whole story, what was happening, and that "I want to go to school." Just see the situation: the boy has to escape from the home to get into school. Boys escape from school, not to go there, and Haridas had to leave his home and ask some uncle, some faraway relative, "Please help me. At least I would like to be a matriculate; then I will see later on. But up to matriculation, that much education is absolutely necessary."

Gandhi was very angry. The prophet of nonviolence was angry, violently angry. What he said was, "Now this home is closed for Haridas. He should not be allowed in and nobody from my family should meet with him. Even his mother, his brothers, his sisters -- nobody should see him and meet him. If anybody meets with him, he also goes with him. He has failed me." You impose such stupid ideas, Now, what Haridas was doing was perfectly right. This man had to be disobeyed. The other children did not escape; they were weaklings. Haridas had some guts. And he showed later on that he did have some guts.

Gandhi used to say, "All religions are one." That was also a political gimmick: "All religions are one -- Hindu, Mohammedan, Christian, Jaina, Buddhist, Sikh,  all religions are one." But the basic politics was to capture all these people and their votes, and to keep the whole of India undivided, so that Gandhi's party ruled over the whole of India, not only a part of India.

In his prayer meetings every morning the Koran was recited, The Bible was read, and other holy books were also included. Just a few pieces read from The Bible, a few pieces read from the Torah, a few pieces read from the Koran,  And there too was great cunningness, because I have looked into those pieces that were read: they were the pieces which were synonymous with the Gita. Only those pieces were chosen from The Bible that were synonymous with Krishna, because Gandhi used to call the Gita his mother. He never called the Koran "my father" or The Bible "my uncle" at least,  only the Gita his mother. And all these fragments that he had chosen were deceptive. They were simply translations, as if they were the same message so there was no problem. All that was against the Gita -- or different from the Gita, not even against it -- was not chosen.

So he was deceiving Mohammedans, he was deceiving Christians, he was deceiving Jainas, he was deceiving Buddhists, he was deceiving Sikhs, everybody. And they all thought that this man is a super-sage -- that is the meaning of mahatma: the great soul. As if souls are also small or great! Souls are simply souls, neither small nor great. But the great soul, mahatma, because he was so liberal, unprejudiced,  and he was full of prejudice.

Haridas knew it. So what he did was, he converted himself to Mohammedanism. He did well. I appreciate him. The doors of the home were closed. Gandhi had abandoned him, declared, "He is no longer my son. I am no longer his father. He has utterly failed me. If he had died it would have been better." And what sin had he committed? He had gone to school! But he was really an intelligent boy. As he left the school, he turned to Mohammedanism. And Mohammedans rejoiced. They enjoyed the idea that Gandhi's eldest son found shelter in Mohammedanism. They started calling him "Mahatma Abdullah Gandhi."

They kept 'Mahatma' and 'Gandhi' so people remembered who he was, and changed 'Haridas' into 'Abdullah' -- which means literally 'Haridas'. abd'allah -- servant of God, and that is exactly the meaning of haridas: servant of God. It is the Arabic translation of Haridas, so it was exactly the same.

But Gandhi was so shocked! You can imagine, if just his son's going to school was enough for Gandhi to abandon him as a son, now he has become a Mohammedan! Gandhi wept. Now, this is the man who says all the religions are the same. So what is the difference? Whether he is Hindu or Mohammedan -- what difference does it make? And even his name was nothing but an Arabic translation of the Sanskrit name -- an exact translation.

Just by coincidence, there was a meeting in Bombay. Just by coincidence, Gandhi was going into the same train from which Haridas was getting out. Kasturba, after all, was a mother; she wanted at least to have a look at her son. She knew that her husband wouldn't allow them to talk, but Gandhi didn't allow her even to see him. He said, "Remember, don't look at him. He is dead for us. He has slapped me on my face by becoming a Mohammedan." He forgot all that synthesis of all the religions,  and still the prayer continued the same way every day.

chukwudi44:

Mother theresa whether you like it or not remains the greatest christian of the last 100 yeras

tensor777:

You are into left-wing politics Jesoul even though you claim to be a born-again Christian. How does that one work. As for the nun Theresa what 's your business with her?
Plough your own furrow.

Dulcet, thank you for all these links and articles. Rest assured, at least one person is making good use of them.

noetic16:

^^^ happy new year madam

why is mudley seriously seeking your attention? what af u done to him?

Dulcet7:

Thanks for the encouragement, Madam. It's been a little while. Hope you are fine? And work/career/school and family? May God's grace abound towards you.

Hello noetic16. I like that name