MOTHER TERESA

With the death of Mother Teresa, this video documentary, which was produced in the late 1980s, is an important insight into this extraordinary woman of God. This documentary on the life and work of the late Mother Teresa of Calcutta is as straightforward as the subject herself. Produced and directed by two sisters, Ann and Jeannette Petrie, the eighty-minute film tracks Mother Teresa from her native Calcutta, around the world and back home to her headquarters.

After receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979, Mother Teresa traveled the world, delivering speeches, meeting heads of state, and receiving various accolades. These travels form the basis for the film, as the camera crew energetically follows the small woman through over half a dozen cities on as many continents.

In the South Bronx section of New York, we see her mingling with street people and drug addicts. In San Francisco, Sisters in her order remove all the amenities from local mission house given by the local residents for their work. The boiler is removed; the rugs ripped out and dumped in the alley; and, the pews in the sanctuary are carried out and simple prayer mats are laid in their place.

In Guatemala, she confronts local merchants who want her mission moved to another district in the city. She prays, and the merchants not only change their minds, but donate more land for her use.

In West Beirut, she prays for a twenty-four hour cease fire, and gets it. Traveling in Red Cross ambulances, she and her Sisters of Charity cross into the war-torn Moslem district. There, she ministers with love to poor, spastic, Muslim orphans.

When the camera crew is not daring such feats as venturing into hostile West Beirut, they are interviewing close associates, priests and nuns, and her only surviving relatives, a brother and niece. The brother and niece describe her origins. She was born of well-to-do parents in Albania and became a nun at the age of eighteen, when she moved to India. There, she taught geography in a convent school for twenty years. The priests and nuns provide information on other periods of her life. She started her Sisters of Charity order in 1948 with a handful of young women. The organization now has hundreds of missions throughout the world staffed by several thousand Sisters. The Sisters of Charity interviewed expressed only respect and devotion for their founder.

Overall, the film seems as spare as the lifestyle of its subject. The expected deification of Mother Teresa is noticeably absent. Her message, however, is simply and boldly stated: to know and serve Jesus Christ, and thus, serve His creation. In Mother Teresa’s world, those much abused words, love, justice and holiness, burn with the intensity of their true meaning.

MOTHER TERESA is highly recommended for everyone. The movie and everyone in it lifts up the real, biblical Jesus, not some man-made heresy. The true Gospel is affirmed with so much love and compassion in the movie that it is difficult not to break out crying at poignant moments in the movie. Mother Teresa insists throughout the film that she is no different from any other believer; that is, set apart by Jesus to do the work which He has appointed to her.

MOTHER TERESA is a great portrait of a Christian in word and deed, which every Christian should see and take their friends to see.