ROME (CNS): While Mother Teresa of Calcutta consciously avoided any involvement in politics, her life and work had and continue to have political implications, said participants in a Rome conference.
“In the history of the Church, the charitable activity of saints always had and always will have political dimensions, at the very least by pushing others to look at the needs around them,” said Bishop Gianni Danzi.
Bishop Danzi, who is secretary-general of the governor’s office of Vatican City State, worked closely with Mother Teresa in opening a soup kitchen and shelter for the poor inside the Vatican. He spoke at a February 13 conference in Rome titled, “Mother Teresa of Calcutta: Is Charity Political?”
The founder of the Missionaries of Charity died in 1997.
Pope John Paul II waived the five-year waiting period, allowing the process for her canonisation to begin almost immediately after her death.
Missionaries of Charity Father Brian Kolodiejchuk, who is the promoter of her beatification cause, told the conference: “From the beginning, Mother Teresa insisted she and her sisters would never enter into a political debate. This would ensure their complete freedom to care for the poorest of the poor.’
