Mother Teresa of Calcutta, a nun who dedicated her life to helping the poor, will be made a saint of the Roman Catholic Church at a ceremony on September 4, Pope Francis announced.

Sister Nirmala Joshi, who succeeded Nobel laureate Mother Teresa as the head of her Missionaries of Charity and expanded the movement overseas, has died aged 80.

Police in India have arrested a hotel management graduate who is alleged to have raped a young Irish woman working in Calcutta for a charity founded by Mother Teresa.

Lasagne, veal and cake were on the menu today as Pope Benedict XVI invited about 250 poor people to join him for a post-Christmas lunch and denounced as "absurd" new attacks on the faithful around the globe.

A convicted paedophile priest spent time living in the Netherlands where he helped out at a shelter for vulnerable women and their children, according to newspaper reports.

Catholic Masses, candle processions and interfaith prayer today marked the 10th anniversary of the death of Mother Teresa, who dedicated her life to serving the poorest of the poor in the eastern Indian city of Kolkata.

Destitute and diseased people still gather outside Mother Teresa’s clinics in the sprawling Indian city of Kolkata where she dedicated her life to helping the poorest of the poor.

Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity order yesterday welcomed the election of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and hoped he would quickly canonise the late nun.

POPE JOHN PAUL II named six new saints yesterday, including a woman who became a symbol for abortion opponents because she refused to end her pregnancy despite warnings that it could kill her.

ADMIRERS of Mother Teresa wept with joy and prayed in her adopted hometown of Calcutta yesterday as Pope John Paul II beatified the Saint of the Gutters.

MOTHER TERESA of Calcutta, the humble nun known as the “saint of the gutters”, was beatified by Pope John Paul II before 300,000 pilgrims massed yesterday in St Peter’s Square.

FROM the putrid back alleys of Calcutta to the shanty towns of South Africa, Mother Teresa’s compassion touched the lives of hundreds of thousands of the poorest of the world’s poor.

Pope John Paul II bestowed one of the Catholic Church’s highest honours today on Mother Teresa, the nun who cared for many of the world’s poorest people.

POPE John Paul will approve a miracle attributed to Mother Teresa today, paving the way for the beatification of the Nobel Prize-winning nun, the Missionaries of Charity said.