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Mother Teresa

  • To keep a lamp burning we have to keep putting oil in it.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in "Saints Among Us," Time ()
  • Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in "Saints Among Us," Time ()
  • We must free ourselves to be filled by God. Even God cannot fill what is full.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in "Saints Among Us," Time ()
  • There is hunger for ordinary bread, and there is hunger for love, for kindness, for thoughtfulness; and this is the great poverty ...

  • Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person.

  • Love is a fruit in season at all times ...

  • God is the friend of silence. See how nature — trees, flowers, grass — grows in silence; see the stars, the moon, and the sun, how they move in silence.

  • Prayer enlarges the heart until it is capable of containing God's gift of himself.

  • ... joy is a net of love by which you can catch souls.

  • God has not called me to be successful; he has called me to be faithful.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in The New York Times ()
  • The ocean is made of drops.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Daphne Rae, Love Until It Hurts ()
  • Any work of love brings a person face to face with God.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Kathryn Spink, For the Brotherhood of Man Under the Fatherhood of God ()
  • The poverty of the West is far more difficult to solve than the poverty of India.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Kathryn Spink, For the Brotherhood of Man Under the Fatherhood of God ()
  • True holiness consists in doing God's will with a smile ...

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Kathryn Spink, For the Brotherhood of Man Under the Fatherhood of God ()
  • It is by forgiving that one is forgiven.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Kathryn Spink, For the Brotherhood of Man Under the Fatherhood of God ()
  • I prefer you to make mistakes in kindness than work miracles in unkindness.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • letter to her religious (1959), in Georges Gorrée and Jean Barbier, The Love of Christ ()
  • Humility is truth ...

    • Mother Teresa,
    • 1963, in Georges Gorrée and Jean Barbier, The Love of Christ ()
  • Love has a hem to her garment that reaches the very dust. It sweeps the stains from the streets and lanes, and because it can, it must.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Georges Gorrée and Jean Barbier, The Love of Christ ()
  • The beginning of prayer is silence ...

  • Violence of the tongue is very real — sharper than any knife ...

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Kathryn Spink, ed., In the Silence of the Heart ()
  • We can do no great things — only small things with great love.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Kathryn Spink, ed., In the Silence of the Heart ()
  • Kindness has converted more people than zeal, science, or eloquence.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Angelo Devananda, Mother Teresa: Contemplative in the Heart of the World ()
  • Failure is nothing but the kiss of Jesus.

  • The more you forget yourself, the more Jesus will think of you.

  • Prayer to be fruitful must come from the heart and must be able to touch the heart of God.

  • People are not hungry just for bread, they are hungry for love.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Barbara Shiels, Women and the Nobel Prize ()
  • And so let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is the beginning of love ...

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Barbara Shiels, Women and the Nobel Prize ()
  • How many times we have picked up in the streets human beings who had been living like animals and were longing to die like angels!

  • I don't want you to give me your surplus. I want you to give with personal deprivation.

  • Holiness is not a privilege of a few but a need for all.

  • The first time I received an award, I was very surprised. I did not know whether to accept it or not. But I came to the conclusion that I should accept awards in the name of the poorest poor, as a form of homage to them. I think that basically, when awards are given to me, the existence of the poor in the world is being recognized.

  • The worst illness today is not leprosy or tuberculosis, but the sense of being unwanted, of not being loved, of being abandoned by all.

  • It is easy to love those who live far away. It is not always easy to love those who live right next to us.

  • I will never tire of repeating this: What the poor need the most is not pity but love. They need to feel respect for their human dignity, which is neither less nor different from the dignity of any other human being.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in St. Paul Pioneer Press ()
  • From the moment a soul has the grace to know God, she must seek.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • Prayer is in all things, in all gestures.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • Prayer enlarges the heart until it is capable of containing God's gift of Himself. Ask and seek and your heart will grow big enough to receive Him and keep Him as your own.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • Let's not pray long, drawn-out prayers, but let's pray short ones full of love. Let us pray on behalf of those who do not pray. Let us remember, if we want to be able to love, we must be able to pray!

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • In vocal prayer we speak to God; in mental prayer he speaks to us. It is then that God pours Himself into us.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • In the silence of the heart God speaks. If you face God in prayer and silence, God will speak to you. Then you will know that you are nothing. It is only when you realize your nothingness, your emptiness, that God can fill you with Himself. Souls of prayer are souls of great silence.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • We cannot find God in noise or agitation. Nature: trees, flowers, and grass grow in silence. The stars, the moon, and the sun move in silence. What is essential is not what we say but what God tells us and what He tells others through us. In silence He listens to us; in silence He speaks to our souls. In silence we are granted the privilege of listening to His voice.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • Holiness is not a luxury for the few; it is not just for some people. It is meant for you and for me and for all of us. It is a simple duty, because if we learn to love, we learn to be holy.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • On certain continents poverty is more spiritual than material, a poverty that consists of loneliness, discouragement, and the lack of meaning in life.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • Riches, both material and spiritual, can choke you if you do not use them fairly. For not even God can put anything in a heart that is already full.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • Death, in the final analysis, is only the easiest and quickest means to go back to God. If only we could make people understand that we come from God and that we have to go back to Him!

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Becky Benenate and Joseph Durepos, eds., No Greater Love ()
  • The fruit of silence is prayer; the fruit of prayer is faith; the fruit of faith is love; the fruit of love is service; the fruit of service is peace.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Maryknoll ()
  • Don't look for big things, just do small things with great love ... The smaller the thing, the greater must be our love.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Brian Kolodiejchuk, ed., Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light ()
  • ... do not spare me in anything — let there be less and less of me in everything.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Brian Kolodiejchuk, ed., Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light ()
  • Love is proved by deeds; the more they cost us, the greater the proof of our love.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Brian Kolodiejchuk, ed., Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light ()
  • To be able to proclaim the Good News to the poor we must know what is poverty.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Brian Kolodiejchuk, ed., Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light ()
  • I can do only one thing, like a little dog follow closely the Master's footsteps. Pray that I be a cheerful dog.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Brian Kolodiejchuk, ed., Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light ()
  • It often happens that those who spend their time giving light to others, remain in darkness themselves.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Brian Kolodiejchuk, ed., Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light ()
  • Thank God we don't serve God with our feelings, otherwise I don't know where I would be. — Pray for me.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Brian Kolodiejchuk, ed., Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light ()
  • ... even God could do nothing for someone already full. You have to be completely empty to let Him in to do what He will.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Brian Kolodiejchuk, ed., Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light ()
  • People are hungry for God. What [a] terrible meeting [it] would be with our neighbour if we give them only ourselves.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Brian Kolodiejchuk, ed., Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light ()
  • We are not social workers. We are contemplatives in the heart of the world.

    • Mother Teresa,
    • in Brian Kolodiejchuk, ed., Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light ()
  • The problem with the world is that we draw the circle of our family too small.

    • Mother Teresa
  • Our life of poverty is as necessary as the work itself. Only in heaven will we see how much we owe to the poor for helping us to love God better because of them.

    • Mother Teresa
  • We shall never know all the good that a simple smile can do ...

    • Mother Teresa
  • I can't help thousands. I can help only the one who stands before me ...

    • Mother Teresa
  • If you are discouraged, it is a sign of pride, because it shows you trust in your own powers ...

    • Mother Teresa
  • Love should be as natural as living and breathing ...

    • Mother Teresa
  • If you can't feed a hundred people, then feed just one.

    • Mother Teresa
  • Prayer is the mortar that holds our house together.

    • Mother Teresa
  • [On people with AIDS:] Each one of them is Jesus in a distressing disguise.

    • Mother Teresa

Mother Teresa, Yugoslavian missionary in India, Nobel Peace Prize winner

(1910 - 1997)

Born: Gonxha Agnes Bojaxhiu.