Mother Theresa

MOTHER TERESA

1979 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate

Leader of the Order of the Missionaries of Charity

Excerpt from the Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech

"I choose the poverty of our poor people. But I am grateful to receive (the Nobel) in the name of the hungry, the naked, the homeless, of the crippled, of the blind, of the lepers, of all those people who feel unwanted, unloved, uncared-for throughout society, people that have become a burden to the society and are shunned by everyone."

Background

• Aug 27, 1910 - Sep 5, 1997
• Maiden name: Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu
• Place of Birth: Skopje, Yugoslavia (what is now Macedonia)
• Residence: Calcutta, India
  
• Biographical highlights:
  • 1928 - went to India and taught at a convent school in Calcutta
  • 1937 - took her final vows
  • 1948 - left the convent to work alone in the slums; received some medical training in Paris
  • 1950 - the Missionaries of Charity (Mother Teresea's sisterhood) started
  • 1952 - House for the Dying opened
  • 1957 - the Missionaries of Charity started work with lepers and in many disaster areas of the world
  • 1971 - awarded the Pope John XXIII Peace Prize
  • 1979 - awarded Nobel Peace Prize