Mother Teresa Speaks to Barack and the Students of the University of Notre Dame

The Blessed Teresa of Calcutta traveled to Washington D.C. in early 1994 and addressed U.S. politicians at the National Prayer Breakfast.

In her brief remarks, Mother Teresa gave the true Catholic position on life -- a message from the heart of Christ -- a message Barack and the Notre Dame students need to hear.

As we have gathered here to pray together, I think it will be beautiful if we begin with a prayer that expressed very well what Jesus wants us to do for the least. St. Francis of Assisi understood very well these words of Jesus and His life is very well expressed by a prayer. And this prayer, which we say every day after Holy Communion, always surprises me very much, because it is very fitting for each one of us. And I always wonder whether 800 years ago when St. Francis lived, they had the same difficulties that we have today. I think that some of you already have this prayer of peace - so we will pray it together.

Let us thank God for the opportunity He has given us today to have come here to pray together. We have come here especially to pray for peace, joy and love. We are reminded that Jesus came to bring the good news to the poor. He had told us what that good news is when He said: "My peace I leave with you, My peace I give unto you." He came not to give the peace of the world which is only that we don't bother each other. He came to give the peace of heart which comes from loving - from doing good to others.

And God loved the world so much that He gave His Son - it was a giving. God gave His Son to the Virgin Mary, and what did she do with Him? As soon as Jesus came into Mary's life, immediately she went in haste to give that good news. And as she came into the house of her cousin, Elizabeth, Scripture tells us that the unborn child - the child in the womb of Elizabeth - leapt with joy. While still in the womb of Mary, Jesus brought peace to John the Baptist who leapt for joy in the womb of Elizabeth.

And as if that were not enough, as if it were not enough that God the Son should become one of us and bring peace and joy while still in the womb of Mary, Jesus also died on the Cross to show that greater love. He died for you and for me, and for that leper and for that man dying of hunger and that naked person lying in the street, not only of Calcutta, but of Africa, and everywhere. Our Sisters serve these poor people in 105 countries throughout the world. Jesus insisted that we love one another as He loves each one of us.

Jesus gave His life to love us and He tells us that we also have to give whatever it takes to do good to one another. And in the Gospel Jesus says very clearly: "Love as I have loved you." Jesus died on the Cross because that is what it took for Him to do good to us - to save us from our selfishness in sin. He gave up everything to do the Father's will to show us that we too must be willing to give up everything to do God's will - to love one another as He loves each of us. If we are not willing to give whatever it takes to do good to one another, sin is still in us. That is why we too must give to each other until it hurts.

It is not enough for us to say: "I love God," but I also have to love my neighbor. St. John says that you are a liar if you say you love God and you don't love your neighbor.

How can you love God whom you do not see, if you do not love your neighbor whom you see, whom you touch, with whom you live?

And so it is very important for us to realize that love, to be true, has to hurt. I must be willing to give whatever it takes not to harm other people and, in fact, to do good to them. This requires that I be willing to give until it hurts. Otherwise, there is no true love in me and I bring injustice, not peace, to those around me.

It hurt Jesus to love us. We have been created in His image for greater things, to love and to be loved. We must "put on Christ" as Scripture tells us. And so, we have been created to love and to be loved, and God has become man to make it possible for us to love as He loved us. Jesus makes Himself the hungry one, the naked one, the homeless one, the unwanted one, and He says, "You did it to Me." On the last day He will say to those on His right, "Whatever you did to the least of these, you did to Me," and He will also say to those on His left, "Whatever you neglected to do for the least of these you neglected to do it for Me."

When He was dying on the Cross, Jesus said, "I thirst." Jesus is thirsting for our love, and this is the thirst of everyone, poor and rich alike. We all thirst for the love of others, that they go out of their way to avoid harming us and to do good to us. This is the meaning of true love, to give until it hurts.

I can never forget the experience I had in visiting a home where they kept all these old parents of sons and daughters who had just put them into an institution and forgotten them - maybe. I saw that in that home these old people had everything - good food, comfort- able place, television, everything, but everyone was looking toward the door. And I did not see a single one with a smile on the face. I turned to Sister and I asked: "Why do these people who have every comfort here, why are they all looking toward the door? Why are they not smiling?"

And Sister said: "This is the way it is nearly every day. They are expecting, they are hoping that a son or daughter will come to visit them. They are hurt because they are forgotten." And see, this neglect to love brings spiritual poverty. Maybe in our own family we have somebody who is feeling lonely, who is feeling sick, who is feeling worried. Are we there? Are we there to be with them, or do we merely put them in the care of others? Are we willing to give until it hurts in order to be with our families, or do we put our own interests first? These are the questions we must ask ourselves, especially as we begin this year of the family. We must remember that love begins at home and we must also remember that "the future of humanity passes through the family."

I was surprised in the West to see so many young boys and girls given to drugs. And I tried to find out why. Why is it like that, when those in the West have so many more things than those in the East? And the answer was: "Because there is no one in the family to receive them." Our children depend on us for everything - their health, their nutrition, their security, their coming to know and love God. For all of this, they look to us with trust, hope and expectation. But often father and mother are so busy they have no time for their children, or perhaps they are not even married or have given up on their marriage. So the children go to the streets and get involved in drugs or other things. We are talking of love of the child which is where love and peace must begin. These are the things that break peace.

But I feel that the greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a war against the child, a direct killing of the innocent child, murder by the mother herself.

And if we accept that a mother can kill even her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another? How do we persuade a woman not to have an abortion? As always, we must persuade her with love and we remind ourselves that love means to be willing to give until it hurts. Jesus gave even His life to love us. So, the mother who is thinking of abortion, should be helped to love, that is, to give until it hurts her plans, or her free time, to respect the life of her child. The father of that child, whoever he is, must also give until it hurts.

By abortion, the mother does not learn to love, but kills even her own child to solve her problems.

And, by abortion, the father is told that he does not have to take any responsibility at all for the child he has brought into the world. That father is likely to put other women into the same trouble. So abortion just leads to more abortion.

Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love, but to use any violence to get what they want. This is why the greatest destroyer of love and peace is abortion.

Many people are very, very concerned with the children of India, with the children of Africa where quite a few die of hunger, and so on. Many people are also concerned about all the violence in this great country of the United States. These concerns are very good. But often these same people are not concerned with the millions who are being killed by the deliberate decision of their own mothers. And this is what is the greatest destroyer of peace today - abortion which brings people to such blindness.

And for this I appeal in India and I appeal everywhere - "Let us bring the child back." The child is God's gift to the family. Each child is created in the special image and likeness of God for greater things - to love and to be loved. In this year of the family we must bring the child back to the center of our care and concern. This is the only way that our world can survive because our children are the only hope for the future. As older people are called to God, only their children can take their places.

But what does God say to us? He says: "Even if a mother could forget her child, I will not forget you. I have carved you in the palm of my hand." We are carved in the palm of His hand; that unborn child has been carved in the hand of God from conception and is called by God to love and to be loved, not only now in this life, but forever. God can never forget us.

I will tell you something beautiful. We are fighting abortion by adoption - by care of the mother and adoption for her baby. We have saved thousands of lives. We have sent word to the clinics, to the hospitals and police stations: "Please don't destroy the child; we will take the child." So we always have someone tell the mothers in trouble: "Come, we will take care of you, we will get a home for your child." And we have a tremendous demand from couples who cannot have a child - but I never give a child to a couple who have done something not to have a child. Jesus said. "Anyone who receives a child in my name, receives me." By adopting a child, these couples receive Jesus but, by aborting a child, a couple refuses to receive Jesus.

Please don't kill the child. I want the child. Please give me the child. I am willing to accept any child who would be aborted and to give that child to a married couple who will love the child and be loved by the child.

From our children's home in Calcutta alone, we have saved over 3000 children from abortion. These children have brought such love and joy to their adopting parents and have grown up so full of love and joy.

I know that couples have to plan their family and for that there is natural family planning.

In destroying the power of giving life, through contraception, a husband or wife is doing something to self. This turns the attention to self and so it destroys the gift of love in him or her. In loving, the husband and wife must turn the attention to each other as happens in natural family planning, and not to self, as happens in contraception. Once that living love is destroyed by contraception, abortion follows very easily.

I also know that there are great problems in the world - that many spouses do not love each other enough to practice natural family planning. We cannot solve all the problems in the world, but let us never bring in the worst problem of all, and that is to destroy love. And this is what happens when we tell people to practice contraception and abortion.

The poor are very great people. They can teach us so many beautiful things. Once one of them came to thank us for teaching her natural family planning and said: "You people who have practiced chastity, you are the best people to teach us natural family planning because it is nothing more than self-control out of love for each other." And what this poor person said is very true. These poor people maybe have nothing to eat, maybe they have not a home to live in, but they can still be great people when they are spiritually rich.

When I pick up a person from the street, hungry, I give him a plate of rice, a piece of bread. But a person who is shut out, who feels unwanted, unloved, terrified, the person who has been thrown out of society - that spiritual poverty is much harder to overcome. And abortion, which often follows from contraception, brings a people to be spiritually poor, and that is the worst poverty and the most difficult to overcome.

Those who are materially poor can be very wonderful people. One evening we went out and we picked up four people from the street. And one of them was in a most terrible condition. I told the Sisters: "You take care of the other three; I will take care of the one who looks worse." So I did for her all that my love can do. I put her in bed, and there was such a beautiful smile on her face.

She took hold of my hand, as she said one word only: "thank you" - and she died.

I could not help but examine my conscience before her. And I asked: "What would I say if I were in her place?" And my answer was very simple. I would have tried to draw a little attention to myself. I would have said: "I am hungry, I am dying, I am cold, I am in pain," or something. But she gave me much more - she gave me her grateful love. And she died with a smile on her face. Then there was the man we picked up from the drain, half eaten by worms and, after we had brought him to the home, he only said:

"I have lived like an animal in the street, but I am going to die as an angel, loved and cared for."

Then, after we had removed the worms from his body, all he said, with a big smile, was: "Sister, I am going home to God" -and he died. It was so wonderful to see the greatness of that man who could speak like that without blaming anybody, without comparing anything. Like an angel - this greatness of people who are spiritually rich even when they are materially poor. We are not social workers. We may be doing social work in the eyes of some people, but we must be contemplatives in the heart of the world. For we are touching the body of Christ and we are always in his presence.

You too must bring that presence of God into your family, for the family that prays together, stays together.

There is so much hatred, so much misery, and we with our prayer, with our sacrifice, are beginning at home. Love begins at home, and it is not how much we do, but how much love we put into what we do.

If we are contemplatives in the heart of the world with all its problems, these problems can never discourage us. We must always remember what God tells us in Scripture: "Even if a mother could forget the child in her womb - something impossible, but even if she could forget - I will never forget you."

And so here I am talking with you. I want you to find the poor here, right in your own home first. And begin love there. Be that good news to your own people first. And find out about your next door neighbors. Do you know who they are?

I had the most extraordinary experience of love of neighbor with a Hindu family. A gentleman came to our house and said: "Mother Teresa, there is a family who have not eaten for so long. Do something." So I took some rice and went there immediately. And I saw the children - their eyes shining with hunger. I don't know if you have ever seen hunger. But I have seen it very often. And the mother of the family took the rice I gave her and went out. When she came back, I asked her: "Where did you go? What did you do?" And she gave me a very simple answer: "They are hungry also." What struck me was that she knew - and who are they? A Muslim family - and she knew. I didn't bring any more rice that evening because I wanted them, Hindus and Muslims, to enjoy the joy of sharing.

But there were those children, radiating joy, sharing the joy and peace with their mother because she had the love to give until it hurts. And you see this is where love begins - at home in the family.

So, as the example of this family shows, God will never forget us and there is something you and I can always do. We can keep the joy of loving Jesus in our hearts, and share that joy with all we come in contact with.

Let us make that one point - that no child will be unwanted, unloved, uncared for, or killed and thrown away. And give until it hurts - with a smile.

Because I talk so much of giving with a smile, once a professor from the United States asked me: "Are you married?" And I said: "Yes, and I find it sometimes very difficult to smile at my spouse, Jesus, because He can be very demanding - sometimes." This is really something true.

And there is where love comes in - when it is demanding, and yet we can give it with joy.

One of the most demanding things for me is traveling everywhere - and with publicity. I have said to Jesus that if I don't go to heaven for anything else, I will be going to heaven for all the traveling with all the publicity, because it has purified me and sacrificed me and made me really ready to go to heaven.

If we remember that God loves us, and that we can love others as He loves us, then America can become a sign of peace for the world.

From here, a sign of care for the weakest of the weak - the unborn child - must go out to the world. If you become a burning light of justice and peace in the world, then really you will be true to what the founders of this country stood for. God bless you!

The Missionaries of Charity are famous for making open-ended and seemingly impossible challenges. For example, Mother Teresa told the world she will gladly, and unconditionally accept, love and care for every unwanted baby. Her request was put to an extreme test when East Pakistan became Bangladesh – soldiers went on the rampage and an estimated 450,000 women were raped – approximately eight months later, tens of thousands of infants poured into her homes during a period of a few weeks (estimates are in the order of 60,000) – the Sisters found a home for every child.

You can listen to the audio of this talk in MP3 format or download it. You can also obtain Priests for Life Brochures here.

Her request was put to an extreme test when East Pakistan became Bangladesh – soldiers went on the rampage and an estimated 450,000 women were raped – approximately eight months later, tens of thousands of infants poured into her homes during a period of a few weeks (estimates are in the order of 60,000) – the Sisters found a home for every child.

Pakistan's president, Yahya Khan, to journalist Robert Payne on 22 February, 1971:

"Kill three million of them, and the rest will eat out of our hands." (Referring to East Pakistanis, who were since systematically slaughtered).

Another thing I have longed mourned about the church is the loss of women becoming Nuns. Where will the next Mother Theresa come from?

Who's teaching our kids at Catholic schools? Where are the nursing Sisters in our hospitals?

It's like they all just were erased from the face of the earth. I know there are still a few Nuns out there--they're hard to recognize, but they are there.....but a complete way of life has been lost.......

“”Whatever you neglected to do unto one of the least of these, you neglected to do unto me!””

She left out a key word: “And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. “ (Matthew 25:40)

"There is one God, and one mediator which is Jesus." That is exactly why no "religion" can claim to own the truth or provide salvation.

God gave us a beautiful role model in Our Lady. She helped inspire women like Mother Theresa and lesser known women, like my mother. She is the example for women to be obedient to God and to love unconditionally.

Women have become hardened, and are killing their own children. Our Lady is needed now more than ever. I'm saddened how some people may misunderstand Catholics' love of Our Lady, for her role in God's plan for salvation. We consider Our Lady our spiritual mother. Jesus gave her to us at the cross. (Jn 19:26-27). She carried Jesus in her womb, she participated in His first miracle, and she suffered a pain that no other mother could have endured at His cross. She is not insignificant.

Our love for her doesn't diminish our love for Jesus. The same way our love for Jesus, doesn't diminish our love for God. It is only a reflection of our love for God. Love is infinite. There is a spiritual war taking place and Our Lady is a part of God’s army. I hope Christians will focus more on battling the enemy, and less on criticizing and parsing God's word. In the end, it is all about love.

She’s not my lady, if you mean Mary.

The Catholic religion has fallen into gross idolatry, Mariolotry to be specific.

The Word of God nowhere tells us to extol her. Men do, however.

Don’t follow men for they will lead you away from the True and The Living God.

The Word of God nowhere tells us to extol her.

"Because He hath regarded the humility of His handmaid; for behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed." Luke 1:48

YOPIOS is quite deficient.

Dear YOPIOS:

Calling her “blessed” in no way justifies idolizing her. She’s nothing more than a modern manifestation of the earth mother that the primitives worshipped, and Semiramis of Babylon, mother of Nimrod.

Jesus’ mother would be horrified if she knew what you were doing, but God in His mercy, I think, doesn’t let her know that Satan is pushing her forward on the earth as an object of worship.

On the cross, by the way, Jesus was handing her over to John the Beloved to take care of, not to a whole gaggle of Catholics to worship.

Dear YOPIOS:(sic)

Here's a clue for you. The acronym YOPIOS means Your Own Personal Interpretation Of Scripture.

Calling her “blessed” in no way justifies idolizing her.

Catholics don't idolize the Blessed Virgin Mary. Claiming they do is simply another manifestation of your ignorance.

She’s nothing more than a modern manifestation of the earth mother that the primitives worshipped, and Semiramis of Babylon, mother of Nimrod.

"And it came to pass, that when Elizabeth heard the salutation of Mary, the infant leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost: And she cried out with a loud voice, and said: Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb. And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?" Luke 1:41-43(emphasis added for your much needed edification)

The Blessed Virgin Mary has a unique role in the salvation of mankind; your denial of that fact doesn't render it moot. As I said earlier YOPIOS is quite deficient.

“Catholics don’t idolize the Blessed Virgin Mary. Claiming they do is simply another manifestation of your ignorance.”

Kneeling down and praying to a statue is idolizing in anybody’s interpretation.

“The acronym YOPIOS means Your Own Personal Interpretation Of Scripture.”

The Word forbids any private interpretation of scripture. Mine is the Christian interpretation of the “Majority Text”, the one used by all the Christians throughout the centuries that the Catholic Church ordered burned at the stake with their scriptures. That one.

The Catholic interpretations are the heretical ones.

Another thing I have longed mourned about the church is the loss of women becoming Nuns

The religious orders that dropped the habit have shriveled up. In their place, however, are a growing number of women religious orders that all embrace the habit.

Among the fastest growing communities are:

Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia - Nashville, Tennessee

the Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist in Ann Arbor, MI and

The Sisters of Life is a contemplative / active religious community of women founded in 1991 by John Cardinal O’Connor for the protection and enhancement of the sacredness of every human life. Like all religious communities, we take the three traditional vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. We also are consecrated under a special, fourth vow to protect and enhance the sacredness of human life.

And there are many other communities experiencing growth. You can read about them Here.

I agree my friend. We have to pray for each other. A few years ago, my aunt went to a new church, and that was great. Suddenly she said we didn't have salvation, and we didn't follow God's word because the term Purgatory is not in the bible. I explained to her that neither is the Trinity, but the concept is explained in the bible. It's like she sudenly morphed into an arrogant Pharisee.

She started avoiding her close loving family and said she was praying for our salvation. My poor grandfather freaked out and did everything to reconcile with her, he silently cried thinking she joined a cult. He died shortly after leaving behind 12 beautiful children and over 30 grandchildren. My aunt claims she left her family to follow Jesus. Although she simply got married and wouldn't go to any of our numerous Catholic ceremonies, like weddings etc. From our heartbreaking experience I can now see the "anti-Catholics" from a mile away. I understand that most Christians aren't indoctrinated with the teachings of "How Catholics are Evil", but there are those that have been conned. It is wrong to reject other Christians and pretend to be better. You would not believe what calumny out there regarding the church, by those that claim to know God. I can only tell you that it resembles nothing that Jesus taught us about love. We do have to pray.

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