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My dear people of St. Mary’s:

This Sunday is September 10. Seventy-one years ago today, a sister of the missionary order of the Sisters of Loreto was on a train making her way from Calcutta to Darjeeling for her annual retreat. In that railway car, the thirty-six year old sister heard interiorly a “call within a call”. She would later describe it in this way: “I was to leave the convent and help the poor while living among them. It was an order. To fail would have been to break the faith.”

The sister was, of course, Saint Teresa of Calcutta. And to this day, the Missionaries of Charity, the order she founded, annually celebrate September 10 th as “Inspiration Day” in all their convents throughout the world. St. Teresa died on September 5, 1997, twenty years ago this year, and was canonized by Pope Francis last September.

If you ever enter a chapel of the Missionaries of Charity in any convent of theirs around the world, you will immediately notice how simple and plain it is. There are never any pews or chairs, because the sisters always attend Mass on their knees. There is a simple altar and a simple pedestal with the tabernacle on it. On the wall behind the altar and dominating the room, there hangs a large crucifix. Next to it, in large, bold, capital letters on the wall, are always to be found the dramatic words “I THIRST”. This is, of course, a quotation from the crucifixion account found in the Gospel of St. John: “After this Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfill the scripture), ‘I thirst.’” [Jn 19:28]

For many years, visitors to the convent chapels (and perhaps even the sisters themselves) may have wondered why Mother Teresa chose this particular phrase, and why it was so important that it had to be on the wall of every chapel in every one of her convents around the world?

Although she was always rather circumspect about the events of the spiritual experience she had on September 10, 1946, in the year 1993, she decided for the first time to speak more about it to the members of her community. This seems to have been prompted by the 1993 Lenten Letter written by Pope John Paul II to the entire church. The theme of that letter was the Gospel phrase: “I thirst”. As she was approaching the end of her life, it seems that she felt
called to explain and best she could the profound spiritual experience of “light and love” she had experienced on the train the day she received her “call within a call”. It seems that, in addition to being called to work among the poorest of the poor, that St. Teresa of Calcutta was also entrusted with a message to bring to the world through her apostolic work.

The future saint, encouraged by two priests who worked with her, sat down and began to write a letter to all the members of her community throughout the world, in order to explain more fully what God revealed to her that day in September, forty-seven years before. Next week, we will look more deeply into that letter.

—Fr. McCartney

My dear people of St. Mary’s,

This weekend we come to a dual celebration of motherhood: in the United States we celebrate Mother’s Day; and in the Universal Church we celebrate the centenary of Our Lady of Fatima, along with the canonization of the two youngest visionaries.

I have always thought it most appropriate that we give thanks to God for our earthly mothers in the same month dedicated to our Heavenly Mother. We remember that, at the foot of the Holy Cross on Good Friday, Our Lord looked down upon his own Mother Mary and the Apostle John and said: “Woman behold your son; son behold your mother.” As Catholics, we understand that St. John the Apostle in that moment represented all of us. So that, from that moment, all disciples of the Lord Jesus for all time in the future were told by the Lord to look upon His mother, Mary, as our true mother as well. In return, He asked His Mother to become the “New Eve”, that is the “Mother of all the Living”.

God knew that, as important as it was in our Faith to have a Father in Heaven, it was also necessary that we have a Mother who could be a bridge for us between heaven and earth. She would be a creature like us, yet sinless like Him. And she continues that “motherly ministry” from her place now in heaven, watching over and interceding for her children, in the way that our beloved earthly mothers do for us as well.

This weekend, at a special Mass in Portugal, Pope Francis will not only give thanks for the apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima one-hundred years ago, but will also canonize the brother and sister visionaries, Francisco and Jacinta Marto. They were only 9 and 7 years old at the time of the apparitions of Our Lady. The visits and message of Mary transformed them, and from then on their lives were that of constant prayer and sacrifice. They both died within three years of the apparitions, succumbing to the worldwide epidemic of the Spanish Influenza which broke out upon the conclusion of the First World War. Aged 10 and 9 respectively at their deaths, they will now be the two youngest canonized saints in the history of the Church who are not martyrs. This is an official recognition by the Church that even children as young as they are capable of living lives of heroic virtue, and so are examples of holiness worthy of emulation by all the faithful.

This anniversary is also a reminder that Our Blessed Mother’s message at Fatima is as timely as ever: to return to the devout practice of our Faith; and to have recourse to the daily recitation of the Rosary, prayed for peace in our world and for the conversion of sinners.

And so, on this day let us thank God for the great gift of our Blessed Mother, and for all our earthly mothers, both living and deceased. May their example of selfless love and sacrifice for us, their children, inspire us to follow their example with all our brothers and sisters in Christ.

—Fr. McCartney