Mother Teresa Set for Sainthood

With the declaration that a second miracle has occurred, Pope Francis had given clearance for Mother Teresa to be canonized next September, the 19th anniversary of her death. Sainthood requires the documentation of two miracles attributed to the deceased individual. The first, in 1998, was the cure of a stomach tumor in an Indian woman. Though the bishop declared this a miracle performed by the dead nun, the woman’s husband said he believed that medicine had cured his wife. The second case, in 2008, was the “inexplicable” recovery of a Brazilian man who woke from a coma after his wife prayed to the dead nun. By her own admission, Mother Teresa found only darkness in her spiritual life and practice. This is documented in the shocking book Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light, the Private Writings of the Saint of Calcutta (2007), which contains statements made by the nun to her confessors and superiors over a period of more than 65 years. In March 1953, she wrote to her confessor: “... THERE IS SUCH TERRIBLE DARKNESS WITHIN ME, as if everything was dead. It has been like this more or less from the time I started ‘the work.’” In 1979 she wrote: “THE SILENCE AND THE EMPTINESS IS SO GREAT -- that I look and do not see, -- Listen and do not hear.” Her private statements about the spiritual darkness she encountered in contemplative prayer continued in this vein until her death, and they are the loudest possible warning about the danger of the Catholic contemplative mysticism which is sweeping through evangelicalism. Contemplative practices, such as the Jesus Prayer, breath prayers, visualizing prayer, centering prayer, and lectio divina are exceedingly dangerous. They are vehicles to bring practitioners into contact with demons. Many who practice these things end up believing in a pagan concept of God such as pantheism (God is everything) and panentheism (God is in everything). Through these practices people typically become increasingly ecumenical and interfaith in thinking. See Evangelicals and Contemplative Prayer, available in print and free eBook editions from www.wayoflife.org.

(Friday Church News Notes, January 1, 2016, www.wayoflife.org, [email protected], 866-295-4143)

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