Santo
Santa Teresa de Calcutta
A teacher who founded the Missionaries of Charity and brought the needs of abandoned people before the world.
From Skopje to India
Teresa was born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu on 26 August 1910 in Skopje, then part of the Ottoman Empire and now in North Macedonia, to an Albanian family.[1] Her parents were Nikola and Drana Bojaxhiu; the death of her father in 1918 disrupted the household’s security.[2] Her mother’s example and the life of the local Catholic parish helped form her religious vocation.[3] In September 1928 she left for the Loreto sisters in Ireland, then travelled to India, reaching Calcutta on 6 January 1929.[2] Her religious name honoured Thérèse of Lisieux, whose missionary vocation had been lived within a Carmelite monastery.[3]
The years at Loreto
Following her novitiate in Darjeeling, Teresa made first vows in 1931 and taught at St Mary’s Bengali-medium school for girls in Calcutta.[2] She made her final profession in 1937 and became the school’s principal in 1944.[2] Teaching occupied much of her early religious life, while the deprivation she encountered beyond the school increasingly claimed her attention.[1] The Vatican biography remembers these years as a period of commitment to her students and fellow sisters, during which her capacity for organization became evident.[3]
A new call, carefully discerned
Teresa described an experience during a train journey to Darjeeling on 10 September 1946 as a “call within a call.”[2] She understood it as Jesus asking her to establish a community for those in extreme poverty, and submitted that conviction to her spiritual director and archbishop.[2] Church permissions preceded her departure from Loreto in August 1948.[4] After brief training with the Medical Mission Sisters in Patna, she returned to Calcutta, initially staying with the Little Sisters of the Poor.[3] She began visiting sick people, teaching children, and organizing basic assistance; some of her former pupils became her earliest companions.[4]
The Missionaries of Charity
Archbishop Ferdinand Périer established the Missionaries of Charity as a diocesan congregation on 7 October 1950.[4] Their expanding work included Nirmal Hriday, a home for dying and destitute people opened in 1952, a children’s home in 1955, and a mobile leprosy clinic in 1957.[4] The congregation describes the first home as a response to people abandoned on the streets and unable to obtain hospital admission.[5] Its stated aim was to offer the possibility of recovery or a cared-for death to people who otherwise faced either alone.[5] A mission in Ranchi followed in 1959; the first foundation outside India opened in Cocorote, Venezuela, in 1965.[4] The wider movement came to include religious and lay collaborators, with assistance extending to refugees, homeless people, and communities facing disasters.[1]
A worldwide public voice
The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded Teresa the Peace Prize in 1979, recognizing her response to poverty and the dignity she accorded individual people.[6] The committee highlighted both the Christian source of her convictions and cooperation with people of other religious backgrounds.[6] In her Nobel lecture, Teresa argued that poverty also included loneliness and abandonment within materially comfortable societies.[7] She asked listeners to begin with the people nearest them, paying attention to family members and neighbours whose isolation could otherwise remain unseen.[7] The address also expressed her strong opposition to abortion and promoted adoption and natural family planning, placing her Catholic moral commitments before an international audience.[7]
Faith lived through darkness
Behind her public work, Teresa experienced a prolonged and painful sense of separation from God.[3] The Vatican biography places the beginning of this interior darkness near the start of her new mission and describes it as continuing through her life.[3] Its interpretation connects that experience with her desire to share Christ’s thirst for love and the loneliness of those she served.[3] Her own public account of the congregation’s vocation joined service with contemplation: caring for a person in need was, for her, an encounter with Christ.[7] She measured an action’s religious meaning by the love brought to it, making ordinary, repeated acts of care central to her teaching.[7]
An admired and contested legacy
Her reputation has also been contested: a 2013 review by Serge Larivée, Carole Sénéchal, and Geneviève Chénard raised objections concerning care of the sick, political choices, financial stewardship, and religious positions.[8] The authors questioned the treatment of such criticism in the Church’s assessment of her life.[8] The Missionaries of Charity’s own account emphasizes shelter, personal care, medical assistance, and rehabilitation for people excluded from ordinary support.[5] At her canonization, Pope Francis emphasized her recognition of human dignity and the obligation to serve across differences of language, culture, and religion.[9]
Death and canonization
Teresa died in Calcutta on 5 September 1997 and received an Indian state funeral before burial at the Missionaries of Charity’s Mother House.[2] John Paul II beatified her on 19 October 2003.[2] Pope Francis canonized her on 4 September 2016, presenting her example to volunteers gathered in Rome during the Jubilee of Mercy.[9] He acknowledged that the familiar name Mother Teresa would endure, linking the Church’s formal recognition with the personal way people had come to know her.[9] The congregation she founded continues its work internationally, carrying her vocation beyond the lifetime of its founder.[2]
Siga la evidencia
Fuentes y notas
- Mother Teresa: Biographical
NobelPrize.org · inglés
Consultado el 2026-09-05
- Mother Teresa, Our Foundress
Missionaries of Charity · inglés
Consultado el 2026-09-05
- Mother Teresa of Calcutta (1910–1997), biography
Holy See · Office for Liturgical Celebrations · 2003-10-19 · inglés
Consultado el 2026-09-05
- Our History
Missionaries of Charity · inglés
Consultado el 2026-09-05
- Homes for the Abandoned: the congregation’s account of its work
Missionaries of Charity · inglés
Consultado el 2026-09-05
- The Nobel Peace Prize 1979: press release
Norwegian Nobel Committee · 1979-10-27 · inglés
Consultado el 2026-09-05
- Mother Teresa: Nobel Lecture
NobelPrize.org · 1979-12-11 · inglés
Consultado el 2026-09-05
- Les côtés ténébreux de Mère Teresa (abstract)
SAGE · Studies in Religion/Sciences religieuses · Serge Larivée, Carole Sénéchal and Geneviève Chénard · 2013-01-15 · inglés
Consultado el 2026-09-05
- Canonization of Mother Teresa of Calcutta
Holy See · Francis · 2016-09-04 · inglés
Consultado el 2026-09-05
Notas editoriales
The narrative distinguishes Teresa’s reported religious experience from independently observable events, and attributes the theological interpretation of her spiritual darkness.
The Nobel biography’s date for the contemplative sisters conflicts with the Vatican biography. That disputed branch date is not repeated; the congregation’s institutional history supplies the foundation milestones used here.
The Vatican and congregation give different counts of houses at her death. Those figures use potentially different categories and are not presented as a reconciled total.
The 2013 critical review is cited from its publisher’s abstract, captured as web-extracted text because direct HTML access was unavailable. Its criticisms are attributed judgments; this biography does not claim to have adjudicated the allegations or read the paywalled full article.
The Nobel release itself is dated 27 October 1979. The lecture’s attribution of a prayer to Francis of Assisi is not used as evidence of that prayer’s authorship.
This expanded biography is an AI-assisted source-based draft. No independent human editorial review or publication approval is recorded.
Este es un borrador asistido por IA preparado a partir de las fuentes anteriores. Sus citas identifican la evidencia; no sustituyen una revisión histórica.
La biografía heredada
La biografía anterior de este registro, conservada sin cambios mientras se revisa el borrador con fuentes.
Leer la biografía heredada
Santa Teresa de Calcuta, también conocida como Madre Teresa, nació Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu el 26 de agosto de 1910 en Skopje, Albania (actualmente Macedonia moderna). Era hija de un empresario albanés que trágicamente falleció cuando ella tenía apenas nueve años.
Desde joven, Agnes sintió un fuerte llamamiento a servir a Dios y a la humanidad. En 1928, a los dieciocho años, ingresó en las Hermanas de Loreto y tomó el nombre de Hermana María Teresa. Después de un período de formación, fue enviada a la India, donde se convirtió en profesora en Calcuta.
Sin embargo, en 1948, la Hermana Teresa sintió un renovado y profundo llamamiento de Dios para trabajar directamente con los pobres y desamparados. Con permiso de sus superiores, abandonó el convento y salió sola a los barrios marginales de Calcuta. Allí encontró pobreza extrema, sufrimiento y la falta de atención médica para los miembros más vulnerables de la sociedad.
Impulsada por su fe inquebrantable y compasión, la Hermana Teresa fundó la Congregación de las Misioneras de la Caridad en 1950. La misión principal de esta orden religiosa era cuidar a los "más pobres de los pobres" y a quienes habían sido abandonados por la sociedad. Las Misioneras de la Caridad comenzaron su labor atendiendo a leprosos y brindando asistencia en zonas afectadas por desastres.
Santa Teresa creía firmemente que cada persona, independientemente de su situación, merecía ser tratada con dignidad y amor. Dedico totalmente su vida a esta misión, viviendo entre los pobres y abrazando una vida de sencillez y autodescuento.
Sus esfuerzos incansables no pasaron desapercibidos, ya que recibió numerosos reconocimientos a lo largo de su vida. En 1979, Santa Teresa recibió el Premio Nobel de la Paz por su trabajo desinteresado y compromiso inquebrantable por mejorar la vida de los marginados. Antes de eso, había recibido el Premio de Paz Papa Juan XXIII en 1971 y el Premio Jawaharlal Nehru para la Comprensión Internacional en 1972.
El impacto de Santa Teresa se extendió mucho más allá de las fronteras de la India. Bajo su guía, las Misioneras de la Caridad expandieron su trabajo a 30 países, brindando cuidado a las personas más vulnerables en todo el mundo.
El 5 de septiembre de 1997, a los 87 años, Santa Teresa falleció en Calcuta, India, por causas naturales. Su vida excepcional de amor y servicio había tocado los corazones y mentes de millones, y su legado continúa inspirando a personas en todo el globo.
Santa Teresa de Calcuta fue venerada el 20 de diciembre de 2002 por el Papa Juan Pablo II y beatificada el 19 de octubre de 2003. La ceremonia de beatificación tuvo lugar en la Plaza de San Pedro, Ciudad del Vaticano, Roma, Italia. El milagro atribuido a su beatificación consistió en la curación de un tumor incurable en una mujer india.
Finalmente, el 4 de septiembre de 2016, el Papa Francisco canonizó a Santa Teresa de Calcuta, declarándola santa de la Iglesia Católica. La ceremonia de canonización se celebró en la Plaza de San Pedro, Ciudad del Vaticano, Roma, y el milagro que condujo a su canonización involucró la curación de abscesos cerebrales en un hombre brasileño en coma.
Santa Teresa de Calcuta es ampliamente considerada un ícono de la caridad cristiana y sigue siendo una figura amada y reverenciada. Su vida sirve como recordatorio del profundo impacto que una persona puede tener en el mundo al dedicarse al servicio de los demás. Es patrona de Calcuta, India, así como de la diócesis de Calcuta y de las Misioneras de la Caridad.
Heráldica y emblemas devocionales
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