Get glimpses of the many chapters in the life of the peace messiah at a photo exhibition that chronicles her years.
If eyes are the window to one's soul, there is definitely something special about Mother Teresa. Even as the 18-year-old stares right back at you out of a black & white photograph, her eyes tell a gripping tale —one of confidence, focus and determination.
Compare it with the photographs taken in the last years of her life and you see a wrinkled, frail image. But little has changed in her eyes. They continue to ooze fortitude and resolve.
One can expect to get more than just a peep into the soul of Albanian-born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu, known the world over as Mother Teresa, at a special exhibition of the Mother's photographs currently on at St Francis Xavier's Cathedral in Cleveland Town.
This is to coincide with the peace messiah's birth centenary on August 26. The photo exhibition was put together by the Missionaries of Charity with support from Subroto Bagchi, gardener, MindTree.
The show opens the pages of the many chapters in the Mother's life — from when she left her own mother in 1928 (and never met her again), to the day she was inspired to start the Missionaries of Charity. Spirituality was an inseparable part of her life, her faith carrying her through every action and decision.
September 10, 1946, was the Day of Inspiration. "It was on this day in 1946 in the train to Darjeeling that God gave us the 'call within a call' to satiate the thirst of Jesus by serving Him in the poorest of the poor," she wrote. Next to this note is a black & white photograph of Mother at the age of 36. There's a gentle smile, there is also the look of determination in her eyes. Same with the colour photograph of her at the age of 38. But who knows what was behind the smile, because she wrote: "The smile is a big cloak which covers a multitude of pains."
Mother Teresa was in India from 1949 to 1997. She had a philosophical view to almost every aspect of life. During this time she wrote: "For the first time in these 11 years, I have come to love the darkness. For, I believe now that it is a part, a very, very small part of Jesus' darkness and pain on earth… a spiritual side of (the) work." It is ironical that the Mother embraced darkness too, because almost every other reference projects her as the 'light' in the lives of the destitutes, as the one who dispels darkness.
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