St. Teresa of Calcutta, known during her life as Mother Teresa, was born in 1910 in Skopje in modern day Albania. By the age of 12 she decided to dedicate her life to the service of God and his people, and by 19 had arrived in India as a member of the Sisters of Loreto.

She began her ministry as a teacher in the community’s school. She taught for nearly twenty years, but as time went on she became increasingly disturbed by the poverty she saw in Calcutta, India. She began to feel a calling in her heart to serve the poor in a unique way.

Then, in 1950, after experiencing a profound moment of God’s grace in prayer, she asked permission to leave the school so that she could explore a new way to follow God’s call. She then founded the Missionaries of Charity who, in addition to taking the traditional vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience, take a fourth to give “wholehearted free service to the poorest of the poor.”

Mother Teresa described her mission as care for “the hungry, the naked, the homeless, the crippled, the blind, the lepers, all those people who feel unwanted, unloved, uncared for throughout society, people that have become a burden to the society and are shunned by everyone”.

Mother Teresa and her sisters founded hospices, hospitals, soup kitchens, schools, cared for refugees, the sick, abandoned children, lepers, those with AIDS, former prostitutes, and the mentally ill. For her efforts to care for the least of the least, Mother Teresa was awarded the Nobel Peace Price in 1979. She was canonized by Pope John Paul II in 2016.

The life of Mother Teresa reminds us that not a single person in all the world is disposable or undeserving of love. May her ministry show us how we too are called to love the poorest of the poor, to reach out in love to the lonely and forgotten. May her prayers inspire in us the love of Christ for all his people!