Mother Teresa and the Experience of Faith

As a Lutheran and as an ex-Catholic, Mother Teresa's private letters are unmistakenly similar to Luther pre-Scriptural awakening. As an Augustian monk, Luther did everthing possible to awaken God's intimate mercy and love, but Luther had only to read Romans and the rest of the Bible to recognize that God had preserved His Word of the gospel even at the cost of human lives defending it (Wycliffe and Huss for example). I feel sorry for Mother Teresa because as a devout Catholic she was not privey to taking God at His Word. I know her despair of never measuring up because that is the slavery every Roman Catholic experiences until the power of God's Word sets them free. I feel that Mother Teresa was betrayed by the Catholic Church which has exploited her after her death in the most obvious way possible against her own wishes. But what else would one expect from a church that hides the power of each believer's in God's grace and not in one's works as salvation.

As a Lutheran and as an ex-Catholic, Mother Teresa's private letters are unmistakenly similar to Luther pre-Scriptural awakening. As an Augustian monk, Luther did everthing possible to awaken God's intimate mercy and love, but Luther had only to read Romans and the rest of the Bible to recognize that God had preserved His Word of the gospel even at the cost of human lives defending it (Wycliffe and Huss for example). I feel sorry for Mother Teresa because as a devout Catholic she was not privey to taking God at His Word. I know her despair of never measuring up because that is the slavery every Roman Catholic experiences until the power of God's Word sets them free. I feel that Mother Teresa was betrayed by the Catholic Church which has exploited her after her death in the most obvious way possible against her own wishes. But what else would one expect from a church that hides the power of each believer's in God's grace and not in one's works as salvation.

As a Lutheran and as an ex-Catholic, Mother Teresa's private letters are unmistakenly similar to Luther pre-Scriptural awakening. As an Augustian monk, Luther did everthing possible to awaken God's intimate mercy and love, but Luther had only to read Romans and the rest of the Bible to recognize that God had preserved His Word of the gospel even at the cost of human lives defending it (Wycliffe and Huss for example). I feel sorry for Mother Teresa because as a devout Catholic she was not privey to taking God at His Word. I know her despair of never measuring up because that is the slavery every Roman Catholic experiences until the power of God's Word sets them free. I feel that Mother Teresa was betrayed by the Catholic Church which has exploited her after her death in the most obvious way possible against her own wishes. But what else would one expect from a church that hides the power of each believer's in God's grace and not in one's works as salvation.

Saints are made by the church for its own political reasons. Some, like St. Dominic, have been persecutors of dissenters. Some have preached pogroms against Jews. Some have had disreputable intentions.

It took the church 500 years to make Joan of Arc a saint -- why? because she called too much into question the infallibility of the church which burned her.

Tim,
I'm offended by your comment to Rizwan Ahmed, and I'm not even Muslim. Getting Jesus doesn't guarantee freedom; in fact, I'd argue it causes a whole other form of repression. If Christians had their way, they'd strip the freedoms you seem to be lauding (freedom of speech) or at least curtail them so that only things deemed appropriately true could be uttered. Christians are no better than any other religious group in the world, because they all want to shape their society to reflect their particular "Godview" as seen through their own particular lenses. You'd shut me up for being an atheist as fast as you'd shut Rizwan Ahmed up for being Muslim. You'd simply subject my children to prayers in school, forced church attendance and ridiculous programs cahorting them to sing "Jesus Loves Me." It's a different kind of opression, but it's still opression.
No Christian has the right to get on their high horse and wave the flag of Western freedoms, attributing it to their God's "reign," as you phrased it, when in fact it was the principle of secularism that created the freedom in which we live, which allows for the open dialogue we are all taking advantage of right here. And by the way, when did any of us ever decide it was your God that "reigned?" I certainly didn't choose to be put under that yoke, and I object to you placing me there!

Rizwan Ahmed, you have things backwards. Think not what a human can do but what God can and did do. God decides how to bring salvation to the world not some made up God plagiarized by a pedophile who waged war. Someone who even killed innocent women and children in Taif when he authorized the use of catapults. Some prophets have blood on their hands and this is true of the great Mohamed, definitely not a man of peace. Unfortunately, one's belief in Allah is not reciprocated by the "True Triune God" because of its delinquency of wrong belief.

Now tell me Rizwan, can I say this in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia or any other of your Islamic nations. Do you think I should have the right to speak what I believe is true in the Islamic world while you freely use this forum here in America and say what is clearly false. Why is Islam so insecure about freedom of religion and speech if you really do have God? God does not need to be protected by your HUMAN Islamic repression; not Jesus Christ, anyway. Where Christ reins their is freedom. Where Allah reins there is not, and that is a fact.

This episode of MT proves without doubt that no human can be God, as christ is believed to be.

The issue with Atheists and religiosts that "if God exists" is a seperate one, totally detached from "If a human can be God".

If you are religious and belief in God, then belief in "True God" is important so that a beleiver can be reciprocated by God.

But if unfortunately one's belief in "human as God" is not reciprocated by God then it is delinquency of wrong belief.

I am surprised Martin labelled MT as honest, whereas she tried to destroye her letters and her INNERSELF was always rebuking her on HYPOCRICY. Unfortunately, MT never listened to her innerself and failed to leave dishonest life of her.

I wish if she would ever had listened to her inner call, which was definately a help from True God and listened to that, she would have found inner peace.

God is mercifull and his bounties are numerous, this is tragedy of humans that they discard His guidance and leave this world as blinds.

This episode of MT proves without doubt that no human can be God, as christ is believed to be.

The issue with Atheists and religiosts that "if God exists" is a seperate one, totally detached from "If a human can be God".

If you are religious and belief in God, then belief in "True God" is important so that a beleiver can be reciprocated by God.

But if unfortunately one's belief in "human as God" is not reciprocated by God then it is delinquency of wrong belief.

I am surprised Martin labelled MT as honest, whereas she tried to destroye her letters and her INNERSELF was always rebuking her on HYPOCRICY. Unfortunately, MT never listened to her innerself and failed to leave dishonest life of her.

I wish if she would ever had listened to her inner call, which was definately a help from True God and listened to that, she would have found inner peace.

God is mrecifull and his bounties are numerous, this is tragedy of humans that they discard His guidance and leave this world as blinds.

Martin, you say "I think less of those who use her experience of the absence of God as proof for the non-existence of God."

Don't worry about it - Mother Teresa (or anyone) not believing in God does not serve as proof that God doesn't exist, any more than belief in God proves he does exist. I think most non-believers know that. I can't help but think that you knew that, too, and just made that comment as a straw-man slam against non-believers.

Also, there's a non-christian term for MT's "agonies" - it's "depression" - and there's medical treatment for it. Too bad Mother Teresa didn't get any -- she could have felt a lot better, even if Jesus never spoke to her again.

I certainly hope your comments don't dissuade Christians who are experiencing some of MT's symptoms (hearing voices, feelings of intense emptiness) from seeking mental health treatment. I'm sure that's not what you intended.

Thank you for this positive affirmation of a life lived for God -- even if God's presence seemed absent. Your comment about using her experience as proof of God's non-existence is apropos, considering what Sam Harris writes elsewhere in this chain of comments.