Something Beautiful for God: Mother Teresa of Calcutta
by Malcolm Muggeridge1971
When Malcolm Muggeridge, then a famous British journalist working with BBC, came to Calcutta in 1968 to make a film on Mother Teresa, it became history. It was Muggeridge’s BBC documentary that brought her work to world notice. It changed Muggeridge’s life too, eventually leading to his entry into the Catholic fold. The book became widely known. Muggeridge noticed how her view of life so contradicts the modern worldly view of life. Mother Teresa did not want anything like a biography of hers because the Lord never had one during his life time. She was just the instrument of His love. She impressed him as one who, by effacing herself in Christ, made an ineffaceable impression on him at the very first meeting. People thronged around her just to be in her presence. Queried about her stand on welfare state as against her work, she replies that Christian love is for a person. Mother’s own writings are deeply meditative, profound yet simple. She reflects that her own work involves suffering without which it would just be social work which is “very good and helpful, but not the work of Christ.” The book also recounts the beginnings of her second vocation and the remarkable growth of her community despite the hard and frugal conditions of life involved, something of a miracle. Radiating the joy of Christ in action is what brings the poor closer to God. Her work is not about providing the poor everything they need. The worst disease that any human can experience is being unwanted. Modern medicine can cure many diseases, but this terrible disease (of being unwanted and unloved) can be cured only by people with willing hands to serve and hearts to love. In the touching last section Muggeridge reflects deeply on the questions of faith, in the light of his encounter with Mother Teresa. It provides deep insights into the problem of suffering. Whereas the world thinks of suffering as an outrage, or “unjustifiable violation,” for Mother Teresa suffering and death are part of the everlasting drama of our relationship to the Creator… exemplifying our human condition. Our service is doing something beautiful for God.
At the Master’s Feet
by Sadhu Sundar Singh (Wilder Publications, 2011)
Sadhu Sunder Singh is one of the best known Christian mystics and thinkers of India. In his life time he was a legend. Many details regarding his life and death are the stuff of legend. This little book is a testimony to the great mystic’s Christ experience. Thematically arranged into six sections dealing with the vital aspects of Christian life and thought, the Sadhu informs us that the truths set forth in the book were revealed to him by the Master and they deeply affected his life. Rendered in the form of an intimate conversation between the Disciple and the Master, it begins with two of his visions while meditating in the forest. Christ visits him in the guise of a beggar. Mistaking him for a beggar, Sundar Singh tells him he has nothing and directs him to the next village. But when the stranger disappears in a flash, Sadhu realizes that it was his Master. The second visitation is a satanic temptation. A man apparently a devout Christian meets and suggests him to become the leader with a large following. In reply Sadhu reasserts his devotion to the Cross. He is filled with the presence of Christ and begins to glow. He realizes that “man’s heart is the very throne and citadel of God.” Then follows a series of conversations between the Master and the disciple in which Christ reveals the divine truths to him. The master reminds the disciple that spiritual and religious ideas are connected less with the head than with the heart, which is the temple of God. As for prayer, it is not about begging for favours, but it is the ‘effort to lay hold of God Himself, the Author of life… breathing in of the Holy Spirit” who is given freely to all. The meaning of Christian service is “the activity of the spiritual life and the natural offering prompted by love.” As for Heaven and Hell, the master describes them as “two opposite states of the spiritual realm.” In its charming simplicity and homely style the book makes a deep impression.
Prof Gigy Joseph
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