c. 1996 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) Her gift is basic for a religious mystic: the ability to see the face of God, as she often described it,”in its most distressing disguise.” Mother Teresa has moved with passionate intensity through the 20th century, inspiring millions with her devotion to the poor who wander the world’s war zones and refuse-strewn streets. And her mystic’s vision is that misery is an invitation to make manifest the mercy of God.

And now, as the frail nun hovers between life and death in a Calcutta hospital, the question persists: What will the world do without her?

The answer is clear to the self-effacing sister who answered the telephone in San Francisco, where Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity operate an AIDS hospice, a soup kitchen and a shelter for homeless women and children.”Mother’s work is God’s work and even if Mother goes, God will be here,”said the young nun, who declined to disclose her name.”We’ll miss her presence in the world, but God’s not going anywhere.” In Rome, Douglas McLaren, of Caritas International, a Catholic humanitarian organization, was less clear about how to fill the void that would be created by the passing of a woman some people regard as a living saint.

But the most important thing, he said, is not the person, but the inspiration that comes from her life and work.”The great thing that Mother Teresa has done is to put the plight of the extreme poor on the political agenda,”he said.”I think her life has given an evangelical mission to the world. The world doesn’t give forth a Mother Teresa too often, but I think that the underlying work, maybe in a quieter way, will go on.” For Eileen Egan, a writer and retired veteran with Catholic Relief Services now in her 80s, the idea of a world without Mother Teresa is an invitation _ and a challenge _ for others to develop a mystic’s vision.”It’s something that all followers of Jesus should share,”Egan said.”I think every religious person has to have a vision and live on the mystical level. I wouldn’t like to think (Mother Teresa) is the only one.” Egan’s 1986 biography of Mother Teresa,”Such a Vision of the Street”(Image Books), is drawn from personal experiences in the early 1950s, when she followed Mother Teresa on her rounds through the streets of Calcutta.”She took me from the Home for Abandoned Children to the Leper Home to the Home for the Dying,”Egan recalled in an interview Friday (Aug. 23).”I was just there for a few days. I said to her: `How do you do this every day, day after day the same tragedy, the same suffering?’ “She said, `To me, each one is Jesus in a distressing disguise.’ Jesus as leper. Jesus eaten alive by worms. Jesus in a disressing disguise. That struck me with tremendous force.” Mother Teresa may not be the only one to perform heroic acts for the poor, but she’s one of the few who was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts. And Egan has a few theories why this one small nun in a blue and white sari gained the admiration of so many.”This little woman still stands for the inviolability and sacredness of each human person. That’s what draws people to her. They want some sign that people aren’t throw-aways,”she said.”A lot of people are wondering what is the meaning of my life,”Egan said.”They see a woman who has nothing but love and is expressing it in works of mercy. They may not repeat what she’s doing, but they do something in their own lives _ even a smile. She doesn’t ask people to be like her.” Though Mother Teresa is best known for her charitable work, few people are aware of her vigorous anti-war activities, Egan noted. She read aloud a letter Mother Teresa wrote in 1991 to then-President George Bush and Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, urging the two to pull back from the brink of war.

In Egan’s mind, Mother Teresa’s plea stands as a legacy for all willing to apply a mystic’s vision to the miseries of the world:

“I come to you with tears in my eyes and God’s love in my heart to plead to you for the poor, and those who will become poor if the war that we all dread and fear happens,”Mother Teresa wrote.”You (have) the power and the strength to destroy God’s presence and image, his men, his women, and his children. Please listen to the will of God. In the short-term there may be winners and losers in this war that we all dread, but that never can and never will justify the suffering, pain, and loss of life which your weapons will cause. … I beg you please to save them,”she wrote referring those who would suffer most.”They are God’s children.”

MJP END RNS