Best known for: Fighting for the rights of the sick and helpless. Medical exams showed the abdominal mass was no longer there, and the doctors she'd seen agreed Besra no longer required surgery. In 1979 she received the Nobel Peace Prize for her humanitarian work, and the following year the Indian government conferred on her the Bharat Ratna, the country’s highest civilian honour. An infection had left his brain with abscesses and accumulating fluid, and his worsening condition made him fall into a coma. The work of Catholic nun and missionary Anjezë Gonxhe Bojaxhiu, commonly known as Mother Teresa and from 2016 as Saint Teresa of Calcutta, received mixed reactions from prominent people, governments and organizations. William J. Barber II Uses His Faith to Fight for the Poor, Sign up to receive the top stories you need to know now on politics, health and more, © 2020 TIME USA, LLC. Letters made public years after her death in 1997 revealed that Mother Teresa spent nearly half a century without feeling God’s presence, “neither in her heart or in the eucharist,” as TIME reported in 2007: That absence seems to have started at almost precisely the time she began tending the poor and dying in Calcutta, and—except for a five-week break in 1959—never abated. Research Says Yes, Biden: 'This Is the Time to Heal in America', You can unsubscribe at any time. The letters reveal the suffering she endured and her feeling that Jesus had abandoned her at the start of her mission. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). In 1999, Father Brian Kolodiejchuk was appointed as a postulator who would promote the case for her sainthood. Initially Mother Teresa worked as a teacher in St. Mary's School in Calcutta, but while on a train journey to the Himalayas she experienced 'a call within a call' telling her to abandon teaching to work in the slums of Calcutta and aid the city's poorest and sickest people. She compares the experience to hell and at one point says it has driven her to doubt the existence of heaven and even of God. Klara Pözl Hitler was devoted to her son Adolf, and theirs was one of the few close relationships in Hitler's life. Sympathetic companions soon flocked to her aid. In 1998, Monica Besra went to a Missionaries of Charity home in West Bengal, India, as she had a fever, headaches, vomiting, and swollen stomach. Pope Paul VI on his trip to India in 1964 gave her his ceremonial limousine, which she immediately raffled to help finance her leper colony. Brian Kolodiejchuk, Mother Teresa’s postulator. Mother Teresa, original name Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu, (baptized August 27, 1910, Skopje, Macedonia, Ottoman Empire [now in Republic of North Macedonia]—died September 5, 1997, Calcutta [now Kolkata], India; canonized September 4, 2016; feast day September 5), founder of the Order of the Missionaries of Charity, a Roman Catholic congregation of women dedicated to the poor, particularly to the destitute of India. Under Vatican law, the first miracle attributed to a candidate for sainthood means beatification can be conferred. In addition to freeing slaves, Tubman was also a Civil War spy, nurse and supporter of women's suffrage. She remained in charge of her congregation as long as health permitted her to, continuing to serve among her people, and died in her Calcutta the age of 87. Around her began a bigger network of volunteers: their tasks ranged from distributing food, teaching, assisting the sick and dying. She was named Agnes, and she later changed her name to Teresa. Mother Teresa founded the Order of the Missionaries of Charity, a Roman Catholic congregation of women dedicated to the poor, particularly to those in India, that opened numerous centres serving the blind, the aged, and the disabled.