wfn.org | Mother Teresa's Humor Remembered

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"UNITED METHODIST DAILY NEWS 97" by SUSAN PEEK on April 15, 1997 at 14:24
Eastern, about DAILY NEWS RELEASES FROM UNITED METHODIST NEWS SERVICE (303
notes).

Note 302 by UMNS on Sept. 8, 1997 at 16:26 Eastern (3824 characters).

Produced by United Methodist News Service, official news agency of
the United Methodist Church, with offices in Nashville, Tenn., New
York, and Washington.

CONTACT: Thomas S. McAnally                      490(10-21-71B)302
         Nashville, Tenn. (615) 742-5470             Sept. 8, 1997

United Methodist Bishop Hearn recalls
visit in Calcutta with Mother Teresa

     CLAREMONT, Calif. (UMNS) -- Mother Teresa with a sense of
humor!  
     That's not the image most people have of the diminutive nun
but it is how she is remembered by at least one United Methodist
bishop.
     Upon learning of Mother's Teresa's death here Sept. 5, Bishop
J. Woodrow of Houston shared with an international group of United
Methodists his recollections of a 1992 visit in Calcutta.  At the
time he was president of the church's Board of Global Ministries.
     "I was not in Calcutta long, a night and morning, but I asked
the headmaster of one of our church-sponsored schools if it would
be possible for me to visit Mother Teresa's work."
     Not knowing if Mother Teresa was in the city, they drove to
the Missionaries of Charity facility. The driver knocked on the
door and announced to one of the nuns that a United Methodist
bishop from the United States would like to visit with Mother
Teresa.
     They were escorted to an upstairs hallway and invited to sit
on a bench. "Soon she came out of her office, short, bent over,
and barefooted," recalled Hearn.  "We visited one and a half hours
and I had the feeling she would have visited with me all day if I
had requested it."
     Asked how long he would be in Calcutta, Hearn said he would
be catching a plane in a few hours.  "Pity, pity, pity," responded
Mother Teresa, "we could work together."  She then smiled and
quipped, "Bishop, you could do the laundry."
     As the guests prepared to depart, she accompanied them to the
first-floor entrance, apologizing that they had been required to
climb the stairs.  
     "As we left I took her hand and was impressed by its warmth"
Hearn said.  "There was something there I couldn't fully explain.
I realized this was special flesh created by God in a special
way."
     When a new United Methodist Hymnal was produced by the church
in 1989, a prayer by Mother Teresa was included.  Titled, "Serving
the Poor," it says:
     "Make us worthy, Lord, to serve those throughout the world
who live and die in poverty or hunger.  Give them, through our
hands, this day their daily bread; and by our understanding love,
give peace and joy. Amen."
     Hearn, president of the churchwide General Council on
Ministries, was in Claremont Sept. 3-6 to meet with the 38-member
Connectional Process Team (CPT), created by the 1996 General
Conference to help the denomination move with greater
effectiveness into the next millennium.
     In an interview with United Methodist News Service, Hearn
spoke about the influence which both Princess Diana and Mother
Teresa had had on millions of people.
     "Princess Diana from a position of privilege decided that she
would reach out to sufferers of AIDS and to sick children and and
to help eliminate land mines which continue to cause injury to
thousands of people," he observed.
     "Mother Teresa will be remembered for her conviction that
every person, regardless of circumstance, is a child of God who
deserves respect and dignity.  Both women were unusual in that
they moved out of normal patterns of what society might have
expected of them."
     Hearn said the overwhelming response of respect and honor
paid the women following their deaths reinforced his opinion that
"what the Church is called on to be is found in sharing the
compassion and love of God made known to us in Jesus Christ."
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