canonization of the Saint of the
Gutters. The atmosphere was electric,
palpable, and as Pope Francis pronounced her a Saint, I had goosebumps and tears
in my eyes. It was a very special moment, not just because here we were
witnessing something momentous, but because, Mother Teresa has personally
touched me and my family. Those ripples she talks about in the quote above, well one of them was me. Let me tell you my story.
I must been about six years old when I first met Mother
Teresa and visited Sishu Bhavan in Calcutta. Though the memory is now clouded,
the visit left a big imprint, so much so that I was drawn back frequently.
Initially I would beg my parents to take me back there whenever we transited
through Calcutta. As I grew older and we moved around, we always found a Mother
Teresa home close by to visit. The habit continued even when I left home to
join university.
You see, the big attraction was the babies. I was born with
an inherent gene that made me hopelessly madly in love with babies. And so I could spend hours there, helping
feed them, or carry them or just watch other people feed and carry them and I
would be contented. My heart would bleed to think that here were babies who
were abandoned and if I thought I could have gotten away with it, I would have
happily smuggled some of them home. But
of course I knew I couldn’t. Instead I decided that as soon as I could, I would
adopt a baby.
I must say here though, that yes,
initially it was all about the babies, but later it was also about so much
more. Mother Teresa’s example of selfless love and service to humanity touched
my family to a great extent. My parents themselves were altruistic and we grew
up watching, learning and soon practicing ourselves, just how to live our faith
and give back to the community with our time or whatever other resources we had
to share.
Well, I grew up, like most little girls do. Many other
childhood dreams and ambitions were forgotten or deemed silly, but this one
desire kept burning bright. In my final year of university, I met my prince
charming and quite soon into our relationship I dragged him one Saturday
afternoon to spend time with the babies. He was a trooper. He got that this was
a big deal to me. Over the next few years we talked about adoption a lot. He
listened patiently, asked questions and brought up concerns.
But my battle plans were drawn and I was well prepared with facts and testimonies.
I took him to more orphanages and adoption workshops. I read him excerpts of
books. I knew one hundred percent that we could love a child we had not
conceived as much as one that had grown in my belly. To be honest though, he
didn’t need much convincing. We made a pact. We would have biological children,
and adopt one too.
We had our first child a year after getting married and the
pregnancy and parenthood was everything and more than we had imagined. Life was
perfect. We treasured each milestone and enjoyed watching our first born grow.
Around the time she started school we knew the time had come
to plan for baby number two. We began the initial paperwork required for adoption and
the wait began. Though shorter, it was every bit as exciting as the nine months
of pregnancy. We looked for names and prepared our families and friends. Our
immediate families were very supportive but we did meet with many who asked,
“But why, when you have your own?” Most often we just smiled and just said “Because we want
to”.
And so at 28, my lifelong dream came true and on
July 27th 2003, we brought Ryeika Teresa, all of two months old,
into our hearts and lives. As I held her that first time, the tears flowed freely. We looked at her angelic face, the sparkling
eyes and felt such a gut wrenching tug of emotion (the good kind). We were so
blessed to have been given the honor of being her parents. Her name Ryeika
means ‘unique’ and Teresa is for the little bent lady, the one in the blue and
white sari who held hundreds of babies in her arms, who fought for their right to live. She believed that they were
all, each and every one of them a gift from God.
In the next couple
of years we went on to have two more biological children and today I am the
proud mother of four girls. Life is full, I am blessed and the circle of life
continues.
I feel so lucky to have had the opportunity to attend the canonization ceremony with my husband and our four girls. I feel blessed that Ryeika was able to witness the person who inspired her parents, who delivered her into our hearts, be proclaimed a Saint.
I feel so lucky to have had the opportunity to attend the canonization ceremony with my husband and our four girls. I feel blessed that Ryeika was able to witness the person who inspired her parents, who delivered her into our hearts, be proclaimed a Saint.
I have read some
disheartening articles in the media recently criticizing Mother Teresa. While
I cannot but agree that perhaps some of her practices were outdated and her
dogma could be perceived as harsh, the simple truth is that she helped scores
and scores of people. She gave dignity to the dying. She set up hospitals and
schools in areas of the world where life has little value, and built safe havens for
babies of unwed mothers or women who, because of poverty or other circumstances
had to leave their children at her doorstep.
I have seen
personally how the nuns from her order look after the aged, the sick, the HIV
positive, the children with deformities and I wonder, if they did not do it,
then who? I have met so many of her nuns, Europeans, Americans, Asians, Africans; brilliant, well educated, charismatic women, who could have had great careers and the world at their feet. And yet they chose to give up all that and wear the blue and white, dedicating their lives to service and
simplicity of a whole different kind. And the beauty about them was that they were all so happy and contented. In spite of tough conditions and bone tiring work, they were always cheerful. I till date have never met a grumpy Mother Teresa nun.
So perhaps more
than all the work and charity and selfless giving that Mother Teresa did, day in and day out, what marks her for
sainthood, is the influence she has had on a plethora of people. People who,
inspired by her example, were prompted to go out and make a difference, be
kind, lend a ear, pray or do a little bit of charity and change somebody’s life
in whatever small way. The ripples....some small, some big, but all so very significant.
Saint Teresa of Calcutta, yes you cast the stone across the waters. So glad one ripple touched me. You inspired me. You touched my life. Thank You.
Our adoption story is now a personal memoir available on all worldwide Amazon sites
https://www.amazon.com/Little-Girls-Dream-Letter-Daughter-ebook/dp/B0785S5HL8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1518092023&sr=8-1&keywords=sanchita+lobo
Our adoption story is now a personal memoir available on all worldwide Amazon sites
https://www.amazon.com/Little-Girls-Dream-Letter-Daughter-ebook/dp/B0785S5HL8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1518092023&sr=8-1&keywords=sanchita+lobo
Comments
Post a Comment