Mother Teresa’s great friend is also sure of a place among the saints

THERE are two Mother Teresas. The first is the Mother Teresa who appeals to fans of mushy Hollywood movies.

She is a happy, kindly figure who goes around doing good to everybody she meets. A nice, simple, Christmas-card style of a nun, emitting a nice bright light like a souvenir you can buy in Knock.

The second Mother Teresa is more complex. Yes, she loves the poor with a love that few other human beings could manage. She does good whenever she can. And thousands of people have been inspired by her example. But she is more than all that.

This second Mother Teresa has a warrior streak. She persists with people until she gets what she is looking for.

She expects her nuns to live in the same austere conditions she has chosen for herself. She seems unworried by the fact that some of her nuns are relatively untrained and not in a position to provide top grade medical care in her homes.

She doesn't lead a global campaign to get better conditions for the poor, and she doesn't shun corrupt, dodgy dictators. As a result, not everyone is in her fan club.

She also has the gall to put spiritual poverty on the same level as physical deprivation. She annoys some liberals by speaking out on the wrong issues when she travels in the western world.

When she meets President Mary Robinson, her opening words are "no abortion in Ireland" as she presses a rosary beads into the President's hand.

That second version is the real Mother Teresa. And, make no mistake about it, it is that version of Mother Teresa whom the Pope very consciously and deliberately made 'blessed' last Sunday.

Our initial attraction to her may start with the Hollywood version, but we don't understand the meaning of the words 'blessed' or 'saint' until we can appreciate and revere the second figure, the fighting Mother Teresa, as well.

Not everybody gets this point. The radical French feminist Hélene Cisoux praises Mother Teresa for being "a feminist without knowing it, an extraordinary and fragile woman who showed initiative, determination and courage beyond limit."

But Cisoux is suspicious of the Church's talk of 'miracles' and 'a divine mission', as Mother Teresa's image is held up to the world from the balcony of St Peter's.

Mother Teresa, if she were alive, would explain that all true human love is divine in its origin. Yes, she may deserve to be a feminist icon just like other strong religious women in the Church's history. But in her thinking and writing Mother Teresa saw herself as a 'pencil' in God's hand.

Her job was not to transform the Calcutta health service, despite what others may have wanted. She simply wanted to bring God's love to the people who needed it most, to the most abandoned and marginalised people in the world. Love, rather than efficiency, was what she was all about.

Love of God led Teresa to say and do many things, only some of which appeal to western liberals. But among the proofs of her saintliness is that very willingness to be unpopular, to suffer, for the sake of the truth.

Another, more mysterious sign, is this: for long periods of her missionary life, this woman had the sense of being separated from God. She didn't feel the warm glow of God's love. But she battled on. That's one of the hallmarks of Christian saints. They battle on.

Watching the beatification ceremony in Rome last Sunday was especially moving because of the many parallels between Mother Teresa and her friend in life, Pope John Paul. Both were east Europeans from countries where the Church was persecuted. Both believed strongly in the dignity of human life.

Both are dogged and determined figures, who fight on in spite of suffering, spiritual and physical. And like Mother Teresa, the Pope will not be long dead before he is beatified and canonised.

The qualities needed for sainthood are clearly there. All that is needed is for the Church to investigate and confirm matters. Look at this Pope and you see a man being gradually stripped, by old age and infirmity, of the words and gestures he used with such panache during his life.

EVEN a few years ago in Rome, when his physical weakness was apparent to all at the World Youth Day, he could animate the crowd by a certain wave of the hand or by shaking his walking-stick. Those gestures are gone.

His speech problem is even more serious. He spoke only briefly during last Thursday's celebration of his 25th anniversary as Pope and at Sunday's beatification ceremony.

The reading of his homily was left to a Vatican official. And on Friday, an Argentinean cardinal was reported as suggesting that if John Paul were to lose the power of speech altogether, he might abdicate.

Is this the last great test facing the Polish Pope? For a man who speaks many languages, who has so much he wants to say to the world, would an enforced exile of silence become the cross that forces him to resign?

The Italian daily newspaper, Corriere della Sera, is in no doubt that the 'silenzio del Papa' is the new challenge facing his ministry.

"The Pope cannot be invisible, but exposure to the public is harming him. Karol Wojtyla's medical advisers want him to cut his workload by more than half. But he doesn't want to know."

The Pope now has a fight on his hands. He is perfectly lucid and he doesn't want to damage the idea of a Papacy-for-life by invoking the canon law provision that would allow him to step aside. But illness is making his situation impossible.

Some senior clerics argue that John Paul II can continue even if he loses the power of speech. He can govern the Church by signing documents and assenting to proposals from his advisers, they say. But this would be in stark contrast to the style of John Paul's ministry.

By travelling around the world he proved he was a pastoral Pope, not just a governor of the Church. Reaching out to people was at the core of his work. Would he want to continue if he could no longer do this?

On Sunday evening, as the people of Rome gathered to honour him with fireworks, he appeared at the window of his apartment for half an hour.

Afterwards he spoke briefly to thank his 'beloved Rome' for paying this tribute. It was one of those things that he wouldn't really be expected to do. That sounds like a yes.