Pope recognises 2nd Mother Teresa miracle, sainthood expected

VATICAN CITY: Pope Francis has signed off on the miracle needed to make Mother Teresa a saint.

Francis approved the miracle during an audience on Thursday afternoon, his 79th birthday.

Avennire newspaper says the miracle concerned the inexplicable cure in 2008 of a man in Brazil with multiple brain abscesses who, within a day of being in a coma, was cured.

The Vatican ascertained that his wife’s prayers for Mother Teresa’s intercession were responsible.

Mother Teresa, celebrated for her work with the poor in the Indian city Kolkata, is expected to be canonised on Sept 4 as part of the pope’s Jubilee Year of Mercy.

Archbishop of Kolkata Thomas D’Souza said the Vatican has recognised that Mother Teresa cured a Brazilian man suffering from multiple brain tumours in 2008.

“I was informed by Rome that Pope Francis has recognised a second miracle to Mother Teresa,” Archbishop D’Souza said in Kolkata.

A panel of experts, convened three days ago by the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints, attributed the miraculous healing to Mother Teresa, Avvenire’s Vatican expert Stefania Falasca reported on Thursday.

Blessed Teresa, who was born to Albanian parents in what is now Skopje in Macedonia, was known across the world for her charity work. She died in 1997 at the age of 87.

She was granted Indian citizenship in 1951 and received a state funeral after her death.

She dedicated her life to the poor, the sick and the dying in the slums of Kolkata, one of India’s biggest cities, founding the Missionaries of Charity order of nuns there. She won a Nobel Peace Prize in 1979.

She was beatified by then-pope John Paul II in a fast-tracked process in 2003, in a ceremony attended by some 300,000 pilgrims.

Beatification is a first step towards sainthood.

Her missionary order in Kolkata — formerly known as Calcutta — said it was “thrilled” and grateful to the pope.

Sunita Kumar, a missionary spokeswoman who worked closely with Mother Teresa, said the late nun was an extraordinary woman who believed hard work was the best way to serve God.

“She of course read the Bible but her main understanding was to serve the poor,” Ms Kumar told the NDTV network.

“Look at the work she did. Not a day’s holiday. Not a day’s rest.”

“I am absolutely delighted that it happens in my lifetime,” she said.

In 2002, the Vatican officially recognised a miracle she was said to have carried out after her death, namely the 1998 healing of a Bengali tribal woman, Monika Besra, who was suffering from an abdominal tumour.

The commission found Ms Besra, diagnosed with tuberculosis and a cancerous tumour, got well after prayers by the Missionaries of Charity.

The traditional canonisation procedure requires at least two miracles.

For all the reverence with which her name and memory are treated, Mother Teresa was not without her critics.

She has been accused of trying to foist Catholicism on the vulnerable.

UK-based Australian feminist Germaine Greer branded her a “religious imperialist”.