when you think of mother teresa, what words come to mind? for me, i think of “poured out, deeply connected to God, amazingly humble, willing heart, in love with Jesus, filled up. sacrificial love” among many others. i am pretty sure “doubter of God”, “overwhelmed with emptiness”, or “tired of never getting His help the way she wanted” were not words i would have used to describe her. it’s sort of old news, but the recent release of mother teresa’s private letters has been rumbling around Christian & nonChristian circles in the past few months. I heard the story earlier this year, that during her decades of ministry she only had a few good weeks where she really felt it. the rest of her journey she didn’t feel God the way she longed to and experienced deep spiritual dryness that was agonizing.
here are some of the things she said to a trusted confidante:
“The more I want him — the less I am wanted”…..”Such deep longing for God — and … repulsed — empty — no faith — no love — no zeal. — [The saving of] Souls holds no attraction — Heaven means nothing — pray for me please that I keep smiling at Him in spite of everything.”
and in some private letters to Jesus:
Lord, my God, who am I that You should forsake me?….The Child of your Love — and now become as the most hated one — the one — You have thrown away as unwanted — unloved. I call, I cling, I want — and there is no One to answer — no One on Whom I can cling — no, No One. — Alone … Where is my Faith — even deep down right in there is nothing, but emptiness & darkness — My God — how painful is this unknown pain — I have no Faith — I dare not utter the words & thoughts that crowd in my heart — & make me suffer untold agony. So many unanswered questions live within me afraid to uncover them — because of the blasphemy — If there be God — please forgive me — When I try to raise my thoughts to Heaven — there is such convicting emptiness that those very thoughts return like sharp knives & hurt my very soul. — I am told God loves me — and yet the reality of darkness & coldness & emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul. Did I make a mistake in surrendering blindly to the Call of the Sacred Heart?
the question is, does this comfort you or freak you out? i think for me, it’s a combination of both. it is so comforting to know that i am not alone in the darkness, that someone far more spiritual & powerful & poured out for God than me doubted just as much (maybe even more!) than I sometimes do. when i doubt, which is often, i hear this ugly little voice in my head that says “you loser, you have been a Christian for a long time and look where it’s gotten you. if you had more faith, you wouldn’t be in such a crappy spot. if you just bore down on the scriptures & started praying harder you wouldn’t be here to begin with. you must be doing something wrong to feel so disconnected from God. what do you need to confess or pray against so the bad feeling will go away?” i could go on and on, it’s all a little psycho inside my head when this starts to happen. i think if most of us are honest, we all have these sorts of thoughts to one degree or another (i think those of us who were trained in the evangelical-think-truth-and-then-it-will-become-your-reality strains have a greater degree of shame when we doubt). or maybe i’m the only one and you are all saying behind my back “what is kathy’s problem?” (yeah, that’s my next psycho thought after the first round…)
what is interesting to me about mother teresa, one of the most revered and beloved spiritual women of this century, is that she didn’t share these thoughts publically. they were in private letters. her interior world and her outside persona were two different things. i understand and respect her dilemma, and we do not have to go around sharing all of our private moments with God with everyone we meet. at the same time, it made me wonder why she was afraid to be more honest in public—would her ministry have been questioned? would she get reprimanded by the powers that be above her and encouraged to get her spiritual act together fast? would she have lost some of her following? i have no idea and because she’s so revered i feel a little guilty even questioning any of her motives, but i guess i am just questioning why her outside & inside had to look so different?
the heartbeat of the refuge is real authenticity, our outside & our inside being integrated. that means we say some of the crazy things rattling around in our head which can sometimes be quite unsettling. and we do this even though we are pretty certain that people (especially Christians) like positives! what sells are results—10 steps to this and 8 simple ways to that. the power of positive thinking, praying, living, eating, you name it. all of these things will get you reconnected to God in no time. no one likes to focus on the negative. i don’t, either. but i do like to focus on the truth. and the truth is that sometimes i am mad, tired, and wondering when-the-hell-i-am-going-to-hear-from-God-so-i-can-feel-better. and despite my doubts, i do believe Jesus came to bring us life, real life, a depth & fulfillment in ways that are sometimes so unexplainable. but i am trying to learn to embrace that real life, real relationship doesn’t mean that i never doubt, wonder, question, get angry, or feel like walking away. in fact, ingredients of real intimacy with God (and people) include all of those things. what i like about mother teresa’s journey is that even though she doubted, questioned, shook her fist, cried out, and sometimes wanted to walk away she did actually stay in. she kept pouring her heart out to God and lived out her passion for the poor & unloved as best she could. she didn’t lay down and die. she didn’t disconnect from life & community completely. she didn’t run the other way. she stayed in.
at the refuge, sometimes it is so clear that life gets harder than we hoped. we long for the easy road, some kind of escape, a short cut, some way to feel better quick. i believe wholeheartedly that Jesus and the crazy unexplainable movement of his spirit in our lives is the answer. but i guess i am reminded today that it doesn’t come quick, it doesn’t come easy and we are in good company with the saints when we doubt, question, and aren’t feeling him like we so desperately long for. i guess what i hope for me—and for all of us—is that we keep staying in.
What I can’t help but wonder is if at some point she realized that she had a role in evidencing God even when He is not “experienced”. We cannot look at her life and say “she did not know God because she didn’t experience Him” for we KNOW she knew God by her life.
And so she encourages so many of us for the dark and quiet times…her life had amazing purpose.
Maybe the way we look at faith forms our experience of it. I think we can look at it from the inside, outside or through.
Most of us, including dear Mother Theresa, probably grew up with ideas of faith that were more inside or outside, and not much through. Tragic because she became the saint of through.
From the inside, we question this thing we have or maybe don’t have- our faith. is it good enough? Kathy, this quote was intersting… (i think those of us who were trained in the evangelical-think-truth-and-then-it-will-become-your-reality strains have a greater degree of shame when we doubt)- very true for faith viewed from an inside perspective. This is the Christian equivalent of the same magical thinking that is in “the secret”, only put into the guise of the faithful. the prayer equivalent might be “your kingdom come, your will be done in heaven i sure hope i get there, and on earth when you get around to it”.
From the outside, faith is waiting for the experience of God- for us to be directly touched in a certain way that we have in mind. It is in the way that we look for it that we sabatoge ourselves, in my opinion. the prayer would be “your kingdom come, your will be done but it feels like i’ll have to wait ’till i’m dead to experience it.”.
God is there to touch us all the time, Through everything all around us- people of all sorts, relationships, experiences, nature (his creation). Faith through life is where I experience and can participate in “your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven”. living out our faith and seeing Christ all around is the reward. Faith is hardly ever talked about this way. yet it is the way I experience it the most.
I wish i understood better what Mother Theresa was looking for. whatever it was, I trust she has found it now.-Sage
I read some about this when the news first came out.
Mother Theresa didn’t mention this publicly because she didn’t want to discourage other believers - place doubts in their minds or fan the flames of doubts.
She did find some comfort when one of her confessors reminded her that Jesus also experienced the same abandonment on the cross when he cried out to God asking why God had forsaken him.
I guess no one is exempt, but Kathy had it right when she brought up the point that Mother Teresa “stayed in”, as did Jesus.
I find it unbelievable that in the face of such conditions, that either one of them could “stay in”. That is what is so inspiring.
I find her letters comforting and disturbing. I think they would fit comfortably next to some of the Psalms. I once questioned why God would allow some things into the book of Psalms that border on blasphemy. I now believe that God included them within the Bible to honor us and our human condition, and of course to comfort us. Sometimes we are angry with God, sometimes we are fearful, we are tired, we question God’s justice, we doubt, we look longingly at the grass on the other side of the fence.
I am comforted by the fact that God is not at all freaked out by our weakness in these moments, nor does he rush to reach for a whip when we question him. Instead he helps sustain us in those darkest times.
While we may not understand it or like it, Job suffered because God trusted him enough to allow him to suffer. Perhaps Mother Terresa faced such a dark hour because she was so completely sold out to her master and could be trusted to keep on walking with him even when she could not see him or feel him.
If Mother Terrisa and God didn’t forsake each other during that dark time, I can take heart that God and I won’t forsake each other either.