A year later she sailed to India with a longing to join them. She became the Principal of St. Agnes’ High School for Girls at Calcutta after years of teaching in the congregation’s schools and convents. A large slum near the school caught her attention. She was deeply moved by the condition of the lowly creatures. Their sufferings stirred her inner self to give up her comfortable living.
Led by her call within she went out into the cruel and merciless metropolis. After she took Indian citizenship in 1948 she went about collecting human wrecks on the streets, housed them and begged from door to door for food.
She founded the Missionaries of Charity in 1950 with just a few sisters. In 1956, she founded the ‘Nirmal Hriday’, a home for the dying destitute in the house donated by the Calcutta corporation authorities. Help from the people was little. She did not give up. The hostility of the local people who wanted to drive her out changed when she housed a dying priest stricken by cholera whom no one would touch.
After Nirmal Hriday homes for destitute children, leper colonies and clinics for the poorest followed. In 1963 she founded the missionary Brothers of Charity. Today, they run hundreds of homes in Asia, Europe, America and Australia. She became renowned world over as Mother Teresa-the living saint.
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She won many awards and honors. She won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 and Bharat Ratna in 1980. In 1990 she was conferred the Soviet Land Nehru Award for promoting friendship among the people and helping the poor and unfortunate. She had received the honor as Angel of Peace’. The awards and admiration had not changed her life or her sisters. She had devoted her life to the service of mankind.
Mother Terasa had also led various peace missions. She did not like to talk about herself and felt at peace among the people of her homes. She began her day with an early morning mass and visited all her homes wherever she happened to be. She enjoyed her work and inspired many to join her.
In 1991 she suffered pneumonia, leading to congestive heart failure. Before she died in September 1997 due to cardiac arrest she stepped down as the head of her order. Her death stunned millions of people all over the world. She was given a state funeral and was laid to rest at Mother House in Calcutta.