Mother Teresa and the Destruction of Christianity

I am not Catholic but I am an Indian. Having lived in India for more than a decade of my life, I know a thing or two about the poor who continuously struggle with abject poverty and hopelessness every day. Thus, an attack against the character and reputation of Mother Teresa is incomprehensible to me. Yet, the ongoing onslaught against Christianity is hardly surprising at all.

The Atheists Humanists Agnostics (AHA) of Dartmouth College plan to consider Mother Teresa’s character by looking through the lenses of Christopher Hitchens’s Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice. According to Hitchens’s Mother Teresa was anything but “good.”[1] Her love and commitment to the poor was simply a façade. The title of the book itself is a strong indicator of Hitchens’s (err) position. Hitchens uses cheap, vulgar, and double meaning to make his case and it is obvious that his interest is merely in selling his book and bagging the funds. Unfortunately, Dartmouth College students blinded by anti-Christian rhetoric are more than happy to support his pathetic cause. It would be interesting to see how many of them have actually done anything to help the poor in their own communities let alone abroad.

It is easy to cast the stone on a woman, now gone forever, who gave up everything to help those who were in deep need. Perhaps these wonderful atheists should consider taking a trip to India and spend one day doing what Mother Teresa did gladly for most of her life. Life in India is hardly as glamorous as Bollywood would have one believe. For the “enlightened” ones who follow Hitchens and listen to the Deepak Chopras of the world, no, the beaches of Goa do not equate to the slums of Calcutta. The heat in itself is enough to make one insane and that is nothing to say of disease, oppression, congestion, filth, or death.

Of course, the idea would hardly occur to these thinkers since the plight of the poor in India is hardly the objective of their gimmick. Indeed, in this case, their idea is to extend a “healthy debate” sitting atop the cushioned seats of Dartmouth College where they rip Christianity to shreds.  After all, how dare Mother Teresa think she could give up everything, travel halfway around the world, live (and die) in the midst of strangers?  How dare she show compassion and love to the poor, an unfortunate group shunned shamelessly by their own society? Such a notion is apparently inconceivable to these godless students. It is unimportant if the poor in India themselves loved Mother Teresa or were grateful for her service.  What is important is that people should have the freedom to debate, defame and destroy Christianity at any cost.  Yes, we should all listen to these great, godless thinkers of Dartmouth College and follow suit without fail. Right.