Honourable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi ji,
Honourable External Affairs Minister Shrimati Sushma Swaraj ji
We the undersigned came to know via media reports that a high-level delegation of Government of India, led by External Affairs Minister Shrimati Sushma Swaraj, will represent the Nation at the canonisation of Mother Teresa at the Vatican on September 4th (vide – News Agencies, July 29th, 2016).
We the undersigned feel that sending an official Government delegation to a parochial religious ceremony is not in the best interest of the country based on the facts and analysis listed hereunder.
The most vocal narrative on Mother Teresa, prevalent in the English media and English-speaking elite circles is that Mother Teresa acted as an angel to the poor, diseased and dying of Calcutta. However, upon closer scrutiny it becomes apparent that this is a cleverly crafted image engineered to deceive the people of India by providing a respectable cover to conversions and other anti-national activities. The counter-narrative is not the figment of some “right-wing” whim and fancy, but has been carefully researched and presented by some of the towering Liberal writers and intellectuals, such as Christopher Hitchens (vide – Book, “The Missionary Position”, ISBN: 1455523003). In his book Hitchens has meticulously studied the life and actions of Teresa. In his extraordinary work, Hitchens unravels the cult of Teresa, recasting her as a spurious, despotic, and megalomaniacal operative of the wealthy who long opposed measures to end poverty, and fraternized, for financial gain, with tyrants and white-collar criminals throughout the world.
Another Leftist author, Aroup Chatterjee, (vide – Book, “Mother Teresa: The Final Verdict”, ISBN: 8188248002), has extensively documented, how the reality of Teresa and her work is a far cry from the legend that is in vogue in certain circles. A selected list of points that Chatterjee enumerates in his monumental work are:
* Mother Teresa often said that she picked people up from the streets of Calcutta, but she and her order of nuns did not do this. People requesting such service were told curtly to call the city emergency.
* While the order owns several ambulances, these are used primarily to transport nuns to and from places of prayer.
* Mother Teresa said that her order fed 4000, 5000, 7000 or 9000 Calcuttans every day (the number varied). The two or three soup kitchens in Calcutta feed a maximum of only 300 people per day. The kitchens will provide food only to people with “food cards” that are distributed predominantly to the Catholic poor.
* While Mother Teresa’s order has some presence in many countries throughout the world, the majority of these are for training monks or nuns, not for aiding the poor.
* Mother Teresa’s shelters will usually only help children if the parents sign a form of renunciation which signs the rights to the children to her organization.
* Mother Teresa often insists that her natural family clinics prevent unwanted pregnancies, but this number is without any basis in truth.
* Mother Teresa insisted that suffering was beautiful as it evoked Christ’s suffering, but when ill she visited exclusive, expensive hospitals.
* The hospice in Calcutta through which Mother Teresa gained such wide recognition is very small (80 beds) and provides little medical care. Needles are reused, all patients are forced to have their heads shaven, visitors are forbidden and painkillers are rarely if ever used. The nurses do not speak the language of the people and are not usually involved in the care of the patients. This duty is assumed by volunteers.
* Mother Teresa often accepted money from suspicious sources, the most notable of which is Charles Keating, America’s most notorious thief.
Chatterjee quotes Mother Teresa as saying, “We are not nurses, we are not doctors, we are not teachers, we are not social workers. We are religious, we are religious, we are religious.” Yet Mother Teresa is known as a humanitarian and one who gave her life to the poor. The reality seems far different.
From the aforementioned sources that cannot be classified as politically partisan, it is abundantly clear that Mother Teresa used poverty only as a ruse to convert the poor, not to help them with their miseries. Her real mission was proselytization, for which she glorified poverty, instead of its removal. It would be safe to characterize her as a ‘soul harvester’ instead of a humanitarian.
In addition to the scholarly work, there are additional points that need to be brought to your notice:
1. The process of canonization by Catholic Church is based on miracles. We do know that miracles which are the foundation to declare someone as saint by Catholic Church is essentially faith healing. By sending a delegation to an event which promotes superstitions such as faith healing, aren’t we compromising with the secular and rational values?
2. When NDA government issued new guidelines for child adoption last year, missionaries of charity decided to not follow those citing ideological reasons derived from Roman Catholic teaching. Why should we send a delegation to the founder of such organization which doesn’t comply with the rule of law of this country?
3. She was vehemently against the abortion and advised the rape victims of 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War to bear the child and give birth to it. This stance of her was also derived from Roman Catholic worldview which was undermining the gravity of issue.
4. There have been several cases against Mother Teresa for financial irregularities as well as accepting donations from people of dubious people and sending it to Roman Catholic Church. Unless such cases are thoroughly investigated, how can government provide legitimacy to a saint who has very fraudulent background?
Mother Teresa loved human suffering. Case in point is the Bhopal Gas Tragedy that had killed at least 15,000. When Mother Teresa learnt of one of India’s worst disaster, she toured the whole of the painfully suffering Bhopal and then concluded – ”One beautiful thing. It has brought out the best in everybody. This has got those people to share, to serve the suffering who would never have become involved otherwise.” Mother Teresa was obsessed with suffering and she lived the belief that when humans suffered, they were living the pain of Christ on the cross. She believed that suffering is necessary, is important as it was only when a human being suffered, he could feel the pain of Christ and just as Christ rose to heaven, so would the sufferer wise to the heaven. Had Mother Teresa not believed that suffering is good, she would have never urged to forgive the government officials responsible for the Bhopal Gas Tragedy.
We the undersigned feel that an official govt. delegation to Mother Teresa’s canonization ceremony will send a wrong signal to people within India, and all over the world. Indian govt. would become a willing partner in proselytization activities by the Christian missionaries by way of committing fraud – a crime as per the Indian Law (Religious Freedom Acts in various states). We do not need to remind you that the state power must be used to uphold the law, not to endorse those who break them.
Based on the aforementioned facts we urge you to cancel the official representation that is being planned to be sent to the Vatican.
Jai Hind.
Thank you.
Petition Sponsors
Satish Verma (sk99311@gmail.com, +91 89695 69755, Ranchi) • Swami Muktanand Puri (mysticguy@mail.ru, +91 95821 47841, Gurgaon) • Poornachandra Upadhya (poornachandras@gmail.com, +91 96868 85051, Bengaluru) • Akash Kumar (aryan5496@gmail.com, +91 97169 15704, Ghaziabad) • Satyaki Savarkar (satyaki_savarkar@yahoo.co.in, +91 98221 11456, Pune) • Rajiv Varma (rajivvarma42@gmx.com, +91 83768 70891) • Smita Mukerji (smita.mukerji@gmail.com, Delhi) • Priya Mishra (priyaa.anu@gmail.com, Kolkata) • Omendra Ratnu (Jaipur) • Aditya Dhopatkar (Navi Mumbai) • Rakesh Sahgal (Delhi)
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This petition will be delivered to:
- Prime Minister of India
Narendra Modi - External Affairs Minister
Sushma Swaraj
Source: World Hindu News (WHN)