Speaker 1: I wonder if you could tell me that story about
Speaker 1: the time that a sister had to go to the
Speaker 1: hospital and he thought, this is going to be my chance.
Speaker 2: So one of the sisters she had been in the
Speaker 2: hospital recently and she needed to go back and have
Speaker 2: a checkup. It felt like this opportunity fell from heaven
Speaker 2: into my lap and I would escape.
Speaker 1: Why didn't you just walk out, just tell someone I'm leaving,
Speaker 1: and just walk out the door.
Speaker 2: We always went out two by two. We were never
Speaker 2: allowed just to walk out and do something, so I
Speaker 2: wouldn't have been able to go, you know, more than
Speaker 2: five or six paces before somebody ran up to me
Speaker 2: and said, where are you going? But I knew, because
Speaker 2: I had been in that hospital and was familiar with it,
Speaker 2: that there was a room where there was a collection
Speaker 2: of clothes that the patients had left behind, So I
Speaker 2: knew where that was. I could find myself some clothes there,
Speaker 2: some normal clothes. I thought, I'll drive in with this
Speaker 2: sister who's ill, and then when we get there, I
Speaker 2: would just leave. I would leave her there, and I
Speaker 2: would have at least a few hours before anybody figured
Speaker 2: out what I'd done. So I took some phone tokens
Speaker 2: and I got in the car and they're in that car.
Speaker 2: On the way to the hospital. I was perspiring. My
Speaker 2: hands were clamming, my heart was raising. It was so hot.
Speaker 2: And as we left the city and we drove towards
Speaker 2: the seashore, there was a breeze and it started just
Speaker 2: to feel really nice, and there were palm trees, and
Speaker 2: there was the sky and you could see the water
Speaker 2: off in the distance. It was like a breath of freedom.
Speaker 3: It was like.
Speaker 2: A way to breathe again. And I just wanted more
Speaker 2: and more of that air, that freedom, that life, that light.
Speaker 2: I thought, this is my chance. I just have to
Speaker 2: take it.
Speaker 1: There's a box in Mary Johnson's house, a boxy rarely opens.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, I've been talking with you lately about
Speaker 2: all of these things, and so I brought this box
Speaker 2: down from the top of my bookcase because I think
Speaker 2: these things do help me remember better and get back
Speaker 2: into the feeling.
Speaker 1: We all know this box, the one full of memories
Speaker 1: of a version of yourself that with time and experience
Speaker 1: becomes more distant, hard to relate to. But we keep
Speaker 1: these things as proof out of you. It's there in
Speaker 1: case we need reminding. Mary's box holds mementos from twenty
Speaker 1: five years ago, a time when she was devoted to
Speaker 1: a different world, an insular community that asked her to
Speaker 1: separate from her family and her past, to focus her
Speaker 1: life on one thing love.
Speaker 2: Well, first, there's this plastic display case like you might
Speaker 2: get some earrings in or something like that, and underneath
Speaker 2: it's just little tiny pieces of Mother Teresa's hair.
Speaker 1: Wow, it's probably four strands or something.
Speaker 2: Would you say, Yeah, that looks like strands, and they're
Speaker 2: arranged in a cross shape.
Speaker 1: So I mean it's hair of a saint that you
Speaker 1: have in a box on your bookshelf.
Speaker 2: And it is not only hair of a saint I
Speaker 2: have an box on my bookshelf, but the hair of
Speaker 2: a woman that I knew and had a very complicated
Speaker 2: relationship with.
Speaker 1: Mary Johnson has these strands of hair in her keepsake
Speaker 1: box because in nineteen eighty she made a vow, a
Speaker 1: vow to devote herself to serving the poor and God.
Speaker 1: She became a religious sister with the Missionaries of Charity,
Speaker 1: the Catholic Order formed by Mother Teresa.
Speaker 2: So I did spend a lot more time alone with
Speaker 2: her than most sisters had the opportunity to do. And
Speaker 2: I loved her. I loved her deeply.
Speaker 4: Mother Teresa helping the poorest of the.
Speaker 5: Poor, Revered by popes and presidents, queens and princesses.
Speaker 1: Particularly.
Speaker 4: Anything that's known about her is shouted in mystery and myth.
Speaker 1: Though fiercely private, the small nun in a white and
Speaker 1: blue sorry became an icon, and thousands of women abandoned
Speaker 1: their previous lives to follow her.
Speaker 6: We were to love, be unlovable.
Speaker 2: You feel God is asking you to do something, It
Speaker 2: doesn't matter how hard it is.
Speaker 6: She was so close to God, and you knew it
Speaker 6: when she was there, and everything changed. You know.
Speaker 1: I heard about Mother Teresa when I was a kid.
Speaker 1: She seemed like the ultimate example of selflessness, of someone
Speaker 1: who saw poverty and actually did something about it. She
Speaker 1: seemed like this perfect person with a simple message. But
Speaker 1: the more people I've talked to, the more I've realized
Speaker 1: how little I understood her, how unusual her spirituality actually was,
Speaker 1: how her legacy was filled with controversy, and how thorny
Speaker 1: and complicated her order could be for the people inside it.
Speaker 2: The order was wired that you had very little time to.
Speaker 3: Think you're only getting input from one source, you isolated
Speaker 3: from everyone else.
Speaker 2: That's what I mean by Brian washing.
Speaker 1: They become the voice of God for you.
Speaker 2: That's all they keep saying.
Speaker 1: Under your valleve obedience right.
Speaker 2: One doesn't always know where to draw the line between
Speaker 2: religion and cult.
Speaker 1: When Mary was nineteen years old, she dropped out of
Speaker 1: college and joined Mother Teresa's Order of Nuns. There was
Speaker 1: no legal contract, nothing physical that bound her to the group.
Speaker 1: She could leave at anytime, but from the beginning she
Speaker 1: was convinced there was no turning back. As she went deeper,
Speaker 1: she learned more secrets about this way of life. She
Speaker 1: saw vows taken to extremes. She felt the rigidity of rules.
Speaker 1: How separate this society, this culture, this world really was.
Speaker 1: Many former sisters like Mary entered the Order seeking love
Speaker 1: and purpose, only to lose themselves along the way, And
Speaker 1: it was a long road back.
Speaker 2: My story is the story of a woman who disappoints
Speaker 2: the most admired woman in the world.
Speaker 1: From a cocoa punch and iHeartMedia, this is the turning
Speaker 1: I'm Erika Lance Part one, No turning back.
Speaker 4: Mother Teresa was busy as usual, saving the world, and
Speaker 4: I mean that quite literally.
Speaker 1: It's nineteen eighty five. Ronald Reagan's in front of the
Speaker 1: French doors of the West wing of the White House.
Speaker 4: Her order of the Missionaries of Charity is spread throughout
Speaker 4: the world, serving the poorest of the poor.
Speaker 1: Mother Teresa stands beside him in her white and blue
Speaker 1: sorry a foot shorter than he is.
Speaker 4: Mother Teresa is a heroine of our times. And to
Speaker 4: the many honors she has received, including the Nobel Peace Prize,
Speaker 4: we add with deep affection and endless respect, the Presidential
Speaker 4: Medal of Freedom.
Speaker 3: I am most doneworthy of this generous gift of our President,
Speaker 3: said Reagan and his wife and new people of United States.
Speaker 3: But I accept it for the greater glory of God
Speaker 3: and in the name of the millions of poor people.
Speaker 3: For this gift, in spirit and in love will penetrate
Speaker 3: the hearts of the people. For in giving it to me,
Speaker 3: you are giving it to them.
Speaker 1: Mother Teresa founded her congregation of Sisters in Kolcutta, India
Speaker 1: in nineteen fifty. She called them the Missionaries of Charity
Speaker 1: MC's for short, and she became famous for tending to
Speaker 1: what she called the poorest of the poor, especially in
Speaker 1: her home for the dying. She explained her mission with
Speaker 1: a Bible passage.
Speaker 3: Jesus said, I was hungry and you gave me to eat.
Speaker 3: I was naked, you clothe me. I was homeless and
Speaker 3: you took me in. I was seek and in prison,
Speaker 3: and you visited me, and you took care of me.
Speaker 1: Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity believe that each sick person
Speaker 1: on the street is Jesus in disguise.
Speaker 3: That's the same Jesus and the distressing disguise of the poor.
Speaker 1: The Missionaries of Charity are still headquartered in Kolcutta, but
Speaker 1: Mother Teresa expanded her mission far beyond Indian She founded
Speaker 1: convents in other countries, and she created new MC branches
Speaker 1: for fathers and for brothers. As her order grew, so
Speaker 1: did Mother Teresa's fame. People loved her message. She spoke
Speaker 1: of love, of having compassion for everyone, of doing your
Speaker 1: small part to help others. It's a message that appealed
Speaker 1: to Mary Johnson. Mary grew up in Michigan and Texas
Speaker 1: in a Catholic family. She was the oldest of seven kids,
Speaker 1: and at a young age she had a special relationship
Speaker 1: with a higher power.
Speaker 2: I had always found church to be something I enjoyed
Speaker 2: if it didn't last too long. I enjoyed Catholic school
Speaker 2: when I was in class, but on the playground at
Speaker 2: lunch time, I really don't have any friends, and so
Speaker 2: I would find some place on the distant side of
Speaker 2: the playground and I would just talk to God. And
Speaker 2: I think that's kind of where it started for me.
Speaker 1: In second grade, Mary's teacher told the class to write
Speaker 1: about what they wanted to be when they grew up.
Speaker 2: Boys, you could be fireman, you could be doctors, you
Speaker 2: could be policemen. And she gave this long list of
Speaker 2: careers possibilities, and then she said, girls, you could be
Speaker 2: nurses or teachers. So write your essay.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: I didn't know what to do because I wanted to
Speaker 2: be either an archaeologist or the director of the New
Speaker 2: York Philharmonic. I used to watch Leonard Bernstein on television
Speaker 2: and I just loved that, and I thought it was
Speaker 2: just the best thing in the world.
Speaker 1: Just two options for girls neither interested Mary. Here's what
Speaker 1: she wrote in the end.
Speaker 2: When I grow up, I will be whatever God wants
Speaker 2: me to be. I have figured that way God has
Speaker 2: learning more possibilities, and he said, than the sister does.
Speaker 2: And so I thought that's it. But somehow it wasn't
Speaker 2: just an essay for me. It was like a pact.
Speaker 2: It was like, okay, God, you show me what you want,
Speaker 2: and I will do that thing.
Speaker 1: When Mary was twelve years old, her parents got in
Speaker 1: to charismatic Catholicism. They were pretty involved in it. The
Speaker 1: local group often met at their house. They'd pray and
Speaker 1: speak and sing in tongues. But Mary didn't quite connect
Speaker 1: with that type of spirituality. She waited for her own
Speaker 1: message from God. In high school, Barry joined the debate team.
Speaker 1: She wrote for the high school newspaper, and then when
Speaker 1: she was a senior, the message arrived.
Speaker 2: And I was walking past our library, which had glass windows,
Speaker 2: and I saw the cover of Time magazine and there
Speaker 2: was this face of this wrinkled nun with a white
Speaker 2: veil with blue stripes, and she had these eyes. And
Speaker 2: I took that magazine from the shelf and I started
Speaker 2: reading in the bell rank for French class, and I
Speaker 2: didn't care. I just sat there and I read about
Speaker 2: this not in Calcutta, who was doing these fantastic things
Speaker 2: with taking in dying people and caring for them.
Speaker 1: She was attracted to the MC's focus on love and
Speaker 1: working with the poor, but it was their commitment to
Speaker 1: the vow of poverty to live like those they were
Speaker 1: serving that grabbed her.
Speaker 2: I mean, the Missionaries of Charity took poverty really seriously.
Speaker 2: And one of the places in the Bible where Jesus
Speaker 2: talks about poverty is during that Summon on the mount
Speaker 2: when he says, stop worrying about everything. Look at the
Speaker 2: birds of the air, Look at the lilies of the field.
Speaker 2: See how your heavenly Father takes care of them. He
Speaker 2: knows what they need me make sure they get it.
Speaker 2: It's gonna be less for you. He has every hair
Speaker 2: on your head counted. What do you think He's gonna
Speaker 2: let disaster strike? No, No, just consider the lilies.
Speaker 1: The article just pulled her in like nothing before.
Speaker 2: This was like my whole heart on fire. And I
Speaker 2: really felt like that was God talking to me. And
Speaker 2: by the time I got up, I said, this is
Speaker 2: what I gotta do. And I went home and started
Speaker 2: writing letters and trying to figure it out.
Speaker 1: Mary wrote to Mother Teresa and asked to join her order.
Speaker 2: You know, And it's kind of that impulsivity of a teenager.
Speaker 1: It was the summer of nineteen seventy seven when Mary
Speaker 1: arrived in New York City. She made her way through
Speaker 1: the city to a new life as a missionary of charity.
Speaker 2: I'd never been in a big city like that before.
Speaker 2: Enormous buildings and these wide streets and all of these
Speaker 2: people out on the street, so many cars, so much action,
Speaker 2: and it was exciting.
Speaker 1: Mary was headed to the Bronx. That's where the main
Speaker 1: empcy house in the United States is, and it's where
Speaker 1: she'd joined new Sisters in training. She carried a cardboard
Speaker 1: box tied with string. It held two skirts and two blouses.
Speaker 1: That's all the Sisters said she'd need. New York was
Speaker 1: a different place. In the summer of seventy seven, a
Speaker 1: widespread blackout shut down the city and led to looting.
Speaker 1: It had nearly gone bankrupt just two years before. Landlords
Speaker 1: were setting fire to their own buildings to cash in
Speaker 1: on insurance, and one of the biggest manhunts in New
Speaker 1: York City history was on for the son of Sam,
Speaker 1: serial killer who was shooting and murdering young women. But
Speaker 1: when Mary arrived, what she noticed was the energy.
Speaker 2: I do remember very clearly emerging from the subway station
Speaker 2: there and walking into all of this sound, Spanish music,
Speaker 2: Spanish speaking. I'd see mangoes on the sidewalk there in
Speaker 2: front of the fruit stand, and just all the excitement
Speaker 2: and the energy of the South Bronc in the summer
Speaker 2: of nineteen seventy seven. There were these groups, especially of
Speaker 2: young men and older boys, gathered around boomboxes and doing
Speaker 2: these enormous gymnastic moves is very very impressive breakdancing, and
Speaker 2: it's just feeling like I had walked into a completely
Speaker 2: different world than the one I'd known.
Speaker 1: The convent looked like any other house in the area,
Speaker 1: a simple brick building.
Speaker 2: So I ring the doorbell and wait a little while,
Speaker 2: and wait a little while, and then finally sister Rochelle
Speaker 2: comes down. She welcomes me with a big smile, and
Speaker 2: she knows my name, and she knows what I'm there for.
Speaker 2: They've been waiting for me. And I went inside and
Speaker 2: everything inside was quiet. Rossel whispered to me. She says welcome,
Speaker 2: and she says, let's go say hello to Jesus.
Speaker 1: After a quick stop to pray in the chapel, they
Speaker 1: climbed to the stairs to the refectory room, where they
Speaker 1: did most everything. They ate their meals in the refectory,
Speaker 1: studied how to be a sister. In the refectory, inside
Speaker 1: was a plywood table, two benches, and a stool.
Speaker 2: I was kind of amazed at how bare it was,
Speaker 2: how minimal it was.
Speaker 1: On the wall hung side by side images of Mother
Speaker 1: Teresa and Jesus. There was also a plaque with the
Speaker 1: motto for new Sisters, a quote from the Gospel of John.
Speaker 1: Jesus must increase and I must decrease. Then Sister Rochelle
Speaker 1: showed her the dormitory, a sacred space that must stay silent.
Speaker 1: They were never to speak inside it. It was one
Speaker 1: room with thirteen cots and they were really close together,
Speaker 1: just enough room between them to get into bed. Mary
Speaker 1: was excited for this unadorned life.
Speaker 2: Things can weigh you down so much, and there was
Speaker 2: a sense of freedom to it. How are you going
Speaker 2: to get along with just these few little things? But
Speaker 2: it's nice. It's the lilies of the field and the
Speaker 2: birds of the air don't need more much.
Speaker 1: Mary arrived in time for adoration. She and the other
Speaker 1: sisters filed into a pewless chapel, They knelt in rose
Speaker 1: and put their heads to the floor.
Speaker 2: The center of this life was God. Nothing else mattered
Speaker 2: in the way that those moments of prayer did that time,
Speaker 2: that time with God.
Speaker 1: They're chanting mixed with the sounds from outside backfiring cars, boomboxes.
Speaker 1: She felt like she'd entered a distant, peaceful planet she
Speaker 1: didn't understand. She prayed, You'd have the strength for this life.
Speaker 1: At dinner that night, Mary and her twelve new sisters
Speaker 1: gathered around that plywood refectory table.
Speaker 2: And ster Carmeline said, Praise Beee Jesus Christ, and everybody
Speaker 2: there started clapping their hands and singings, we welcome, welcome sister,
Speaker 2: We welcome, welcome sister. We welcome welcome sister from our hut,
Speaker 2: just as they had sung to each new sister who
Speaker 2: arrived and would continue to sing to each one after me.
Speaker 1: When a woman enters the Missionaries of Charity, she starts
Speaker 1: as an aspirant. Mary's aspirancy would last six months. She
Speaker 1: wore a conservative blouse and skirt. The white sorry would
Speaker 1: come later. She quickly learns that days in the Missionaries
Speaker 1: of Charity were strictly regimented a bell rang to signal
Speaker 1: time for a new task.
Speaker 2: The bell marked absolutely everything we did, and whenever it rang,
Speaker 2: whatever it rang, Mother told us we were to stop
Speaker 2: immediately doing whatever we were doing, because the bell was
Speaker 2: the voice of God.
Speaker 1: The sisters had a tight timetable. Wake up at four
Speaker 1: forty in the morning, pray, make beds, clean the house
Speaker 1: only twenty minutes for that, wash clothes by hand at
Speaker 1: ten mass, eat breakfast all before eight o'clock, then go
Speaker 1: out to work in the community. There was also the
Speaker 1: kneeling and praying hours of it every day.
Speaker 2: I loved the fact that prayer was so central to
Speaker 2: the lives of the missionaries of charity, but my knees
Speaker 2: hurt like hell.
Speaker 1: There were times for spiritual reading and instruction, and they
Speaker 1: got thirty minutes of what they called recreation, basically when
Speaker 1: they all sat in the refectory and caught up on
Speaker 1: work like mending clothes. The aspirants reported to a mistress
Speaker 1: in charge, the aspiring mistress. She taught them how to
Speaker 1: follow the rules.
Speaker 2: I was under very close scrutiny, and my aspirant mistress
Speaker 2: would correct every mistake she saw, and she'd do it
Speaker 2: publicly and she'd do it loudly, kind of like the
Speaker 2: drill sergeant.
Speaker 5: The idea behind the Mission of Charity training is just
Speaker 5: like military training, to break you down into nothing.
Speaker 1: This is Kelly Dunham. She also joined the Missionaries of
Speaker 1: Charity and began her training in the same convent as Mary,
Speaker 1: but seventeen years later, in nineteen ninety four.
Speaker 5: In those first months, it seemed like the whole idea
Speaker 5: was to make you feel as alone as possible, with
Speaker 5: the idea that you would depend only on God.
Speaker 1: Kelly says that like in boot camp, you did what
Speaker 1: you were told, whether or not it made sense to you.
Speaker 1: She struggled with that, but she loved the moments of
Speaker 1: beauty working as a group for a cause, and their
Speaker 1: nightly songs. After evening prayer, all of the sisters would
Speaker 1: walk outside and stand around a statue of Mary, the
Speaker 1: Mother of Jesus.
Speaker 5: Then you sing a little song to Mary, and everyone
Speaker 5: does like a little silent prayer, and usually touches the statue.
Speaker 5: I think, on the feet and then goes up. Created
Speaker 5: a moment, a moment of honoring something bigger than yourself.
Speaker 5: And it's just like by candle lights, right, So it's
Speaker 5: actually extremely like poignant, and it's a moment, right like
Speaker 5: it's a moment. I still can almost get tearful thinking
Speaker 5: about that. And I can remember one night we were
Speaker 5: all standing around the statue of Mary with all the sisters,
Speaker 5: their faces reflected lighted up by just the candle light,
Speaker 5: and I remember thinking, Oh, man, I get to be
Speaker 5: with all these beautiful women the rest of my life.
Speaker 1: Mary Johnson had been in the convent for two weeks
Speaker 1: when there is a big announcement Mother Teresa was coming.
Speaker 2: We got so excited, you know, it just shouted there,
Speaker 2: just oh so excited. She told us during dinner, so
Speaker 2: it was a time when we could speak, and we did.
Speaker 1: Mary couldn't believe she'd finally meet this woman people called
Speaker 1: a living saint.
Speaker 2: You know, I'd heard about saints, some of saints had
Speaker 2: these abilities where they could read people's souls. If she
Speaker 2: was like that, she probably wouldn't like me, I thought.
Speaker 2: And the other thing I was scared about was what
Speaker 2: would happen if it turned out I didn't like her.
Speaker 2: I decided what I would do was I would go
Speaker 2: to the top of the staircase because Mother Tresa would
Speaker 2: come in the front door and if I positioned myself
Speaker 2: just right on those stairs, i'd be able to see her.
Speaker 2: And when the door opened and Mother was the first
Speaker 2: one to come in, and I saw her there, this tiny,
Speaker 2: short woman with so many wrinkles, and she just looked
Speaker 2: so small and so determined. And the aspirants who had
Speaker 2: been waiting and were down there on that floor, Oh, Mother, Mother,
Speaker 2: and they were saying things, and she would It was like,
Speaker 2: let me say hello to Jesus. First, Mother must say
Speaker 2: hello to Jesus. It was the first time I heard
Speaker 2: her talk about herself in the third person, which was
Speaker 2: something she did all the time. But I didn't know that.
Speaker 2: Then I thought, Ooh.
Speaker 3: Mother.
Speaker 1: Teresa looked utterly focused as she took off her sandals
Speaker 1: and walked to the chapel. Then she knelt to pray.
Speaker 2: I had never seen anyone somehow that connected with God.
Speaker 2: I felt that something holy was happening there.
Speaker 1: One day, Mother Teresa sat down at the Aspirens table
Speaker 1: to talk with the young women entering her order. She
Speaker 1: shared a clear message, one that would reverberate in Mary's
Speaker 1: mind for the next twenty years.
Speaker 2: God called you to come here. Jesus did not call
Speaker 2: your sister did not call your neighbor. Jesus called you
Speaker 2: to be here. And she said God has called you.
Speaker 2: You must be faithful for life, or pack up and
Speaker 2: go home right now. And she was so clear and
Speaker 2: so strong and not a little bit scary, and she
Speaker 2: was saying, just to people who had been there for
Speaker 2: for two weeks basically and hadn't figured it out yet,
Speaker 2: didn't know exactly did God call me? That's a very
Speaker 2: amorphous question. But Mother was sure. She said, you're here.
Speaker 2: That means God called you here, and now you must
Speaker 2: be faithful for life.
Speaker 1: She brought the twelve aspirants to the chapel and had
Speaker 1: the kneel in a row at the front. Then she
Speaker 1: went down the line and gave them each a crucifix.
Speaker 1: She brought the crucifix to each sister's lips for a kiss.
Speaker 2: She pressed that crucifix so strongly against my lips that
Speaker 2: you know, it's like you can hardly respond with any
Speaker 2: sort of kiss because she pushes it there and then
Speaker 2: she pulls it away. Mother did everything forcefully, wholeheartedly. You know,
Speaker 2: you feel that kind of electricity when something special is happening,
Speaker 2: where your whole body just kind of tingles and feels alive,
Speaker 2: and at the same time there was a kind of
Speaker 2: a I think the reluctance wasn't so much in my body.
Speaker 2: The reluctance was more in my mind. But physically I
Speaker 2: was very excited. I was kind of full in. I
Speaker 2: remember whenever Mother spoke, just being so taken in by
Speaker 2: her words and by her conviction and by the power
Speaker 2: of her own belief, that you really just looked at
Speaker 2: her and could not look away. Okay, now I have
Speaker 2: to be a better person than I have ever been
Speaker 2: in my whole life. The bar's been raised.
Speaker 1: When Mother Teresa told Mary and the other Aspirans that
Speaker 1: they were chosen, she said it came with a lifelong commitment.
Speaker 1: It was like a marriage. They must be faithful to
Speaker 1: God and their vows. All Catholic nuns take vows of poverty, chastity,
Speaker 1: and obedience. Mother Teresa added a fourth vow for her sisters,
Speaker 1: the vow of wholehearted and free service to the poorest
Speaker 1: of the poor. Mother Teresa said, to succeed in your vows,
Speaker 1: you just need to do one thing. Follow the constitutions.
Speaker 1: That's the governing document of the missionaries of charity. Legend
Speaker 1: was that early on, while everyone slept, Mother Teresa wrote
Speaker 1: the Constitutions by candlelight. Then the Vatican authorized it as
Speaker 1: an infallible path to holiness. The Constitutions laid out a
Speaker 1: life of love and service in the extreme.
Speaker 2: That the attraction is really that life of sacrifice. You
Speaker 2: want to do something different, you want to do something radical,
Speaker 2: even if it's very conservative, it's also very.
Speaker 1: Radical to do this. The Aspirants had a daily rule
Speaker 1: class taught by the mistress. Mary's mistress wore glasses. She
Speaker 1: was short and stern.
Speaker 2: Sister Carmelin sat on her little stool at the head
Speaker 2: of the table, and she passed out the constitution books,
Speaker 2: page to open to, which number on that page to read,
Speaker 2: and we'd read it together, and then we'd close the books,
Speaker 2: and then at the end of class she would collect them.
Speaker 2: And it's kind of like, I knew there were things
Speaker 2: in that book she did not want us to see
Speaker 2: it as curious about those.
Speaker 1: Gradually Mary learned the rules from her mistress. She learned
Speaker 1: how to.
Speaker 2: Walk briskly, quickly, you don't want to waste any time,
Speaker 2: but not like wild elephants.
Speaker 1: How to talk.
Speaker 2: We weren't supposed to talk about really anything that went
Speaker 2: on outside, you know, whether it was books or movies.
Speaker 1: How to wear her hair.
Speaker 2: And make a ponytail like decent girls.
Speaker 1: How to keep custody of the eyes.
Speaker 2: We weren't supposed to be looking around at anything, really,
Speaker 2: but especially not billboards or newsstands.
Speaker 1: Even how to fall napkin always.
Speaker 2: In a triangle with an extra part hanging down, And
Speaker 2: that was that triangle is the Trinity. I should think
Speaker 2: of the Trinity every time you fold it in this
Speaker 2: particular way.
Speaker 1: Your superior was considered the direct voice of God, and
Speaker 1: the vow of obedience meant obey your superior without question.
Speaker 2: Any time a superior entered the room, we were all
Speaker 2: to stand and to sit only when she sat or
Speaker 2: indicated in some other way that we should sit.
Speaker 1: Then there was the vow of poverty. Pretty much all
Speaker 1: Catholic nuns take a vow of poverty, but Mother Teresa
Speaker 1: took it a step further. She explained it in an
Speaker 1: interview on IRIS TV.
Speaker 3: If you really want to know the poor, we must
Speaker 3: know what is poverty. And that's why in our society,
Speaker 3: poverty is our freedom and our strength.
Speaker 1: The missionaries of charity relied on donations and divine providence,
Speaker 1: and over the years the Order received large donations millions
Speaker 1: of dollars worth because of the interest their work inspired.
Speaker 1: But the sisters lived meager lives regardless of how much
Speaker 1: money the organization raised. They lived as though they didn't
Speaker 1: have any for the sake of their vow.
Speaker 6: The life of poverty of the Missionaries of Charity is
Speaker 6: a very poor life. It is a poor life.
Speaker 1: This is Sister Kathleen Hughes.
Speaker 6: I remember my first breakfast in London. I never forget.
Speaker 6: It was kind of moldy bread, and then we got
Speaker 6: the airport cheeses from the air you know, somebody would
Speaker 6: bring us these little individual cheeses from the planes, you see,
Speaker 6: and they were over ripe by the time we got them.
Speaker 6: So I had a mouthful of moldy bread and this
Speaker 6: over ripe Camembert cheese, and I remember saying to the Lord,
Speaker 6: is every breakfast for the rest of my life going.
Speaker 1: To be like ft?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 6: No, it was an initiation, It was a test.
Speaker 5: The Missionaries of Charity don't have fans or air conditioners.
Speaker 1: That's Kelli Doneham again.
Speaker 5: And in the Bronx at that time, we weren't even
Speaker 5: opening the windows during the night, you know, so it
Speaker 5: was really really hot. So we didn't wear deodorant. We're
Speaker 5: wearing like three or four layers between the outside so
Speaker 5: even when you sweated, it didn't make you cooler because
Speaker 5: it wasn't evaporating, was just getting trapped by the outside layer.
Speaker 5: And I remember saying to the sisters like, we don't
Speaker 5: smell very good, and she's like, oh, such a blessing
Speaker 5: to help with chastity.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 2: Mother Teresa was very concerned about maintaining the vow of chastity,
Speaker 2: really almost to the point of paranoia about it, and
Speaker 2: she passed then on to everybody else in Ordle class.
Speaker 1: Mary learned chastity meant more than not having sex for
Speaker 1: missionaries of charity, and meant no touching period. The sisters
Speaker 1: should never touch each other and the people they cared for.
Speaker 1: Mother Teresa said, touch them as little as possible.
Speaker 2: She would say, sometimes, of course it's necessary. You have
Speaker 2: to touch the babies, you have to feed the babies,
Speaker 2: but as soon as that baby is fed, you put
Speaker 2: that baby down.
Speaker 1: The vow of chastity is why talking was so controlled,
Speaker 1: to make sure sisters didn't get too close. They could
Speaker 1: only talk at approved times, usually when they were all together.
Speaker 1: When sisters walked outside the convent, always in twos, they
Speaker 1: didn't talk. Instead, they prayed the Rosary. Allowed together, on sidewalks,
Speaker 1: on buses, everywhere.
Speaker 2: You could not have a friend. This was very specifically prohibited.
Speaker 2: They call it particular friendship. If somebody saw you getting
Speaker 2: kind of closer to one sister than to another, you
Speaker 2: would be called out on it. They were afraid that
Speaker 2: if you got too close to somebody, everybody else would
Speaker 2: feel excluded. And then the other fear was that particular
Speaker 2: friendship was kind of a name for like relationships of
Speaker 2: a homosexual nature. If you got too close to somebody,
Speaker 2: it was really you were playing with fire.
Speaker 1: I'm cutting in here right now because I think for
Speaker 1: a story like this, it's important for you to know
Speaker 1: where I'm coming from. And to do that, I'd like
Speaker 1: to introduce you to someone. Her name is Allen.
Speaker 7: So Hi, I'm Ailan, and I'm your sister Erica, like
Speaker 7: actual sister, not religious sister. Yeah, And over the past
Speaker 7: year we've actually been working on this podcast together. We've
Speaker 7: been producing it together.
Speaker 1: I'm curious. I mean, when I called you and asked
Speaker 1: you to work on this project. What did you think?
Speaker 7: I thought, you know what, that makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 8: Really.
Speaker 7: I think it's because, you know, we went to Catholic
Speaker 7: school when we were young, even though we weren't Catholic,
Speaker 7: and we had nuns as teachers, and I think you
Speaker 7: really looked up to them.
Speaker 1: Erica, Yeah, I looked up to them, and I was
Speaker 1: also really interested in them. Do you remember they lived
Speaker 1: in a house, like right by the school. It was
Speaker 1: down the drive from the school. We'd pass it every day.
Speaker 1: It was white.
Speaker 7: Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: Whenever we went past that house, I would look at
Speaker 1: it and just wonder what their lives were like in
Speaker 1: that house, Like what are the rooms they're sleeping in?
Speaker 1: How did they become nuns? Like how do you make
Speaker 1: that choice? It's weird to look back, but I actually
Speaker 1: think in second grade I made a list of all
Speaker 1: the things I wanted to be when I grew up,
Speaker 1: which was a really long list, but one of the
Speaker 1: things I included was to be a nun, which is
Speaker 1: strange to think back on now, but I was really
Speaker 1: taken with them.
Speaker 7: Yeah, you were.
Speaker 1: I kind of feel like in a way this podcast,
Speaker 1: it's like I'm getting to look inside that house, you know.
Speaker 1: You know, that's one reason I wanted to work on
Speaker 1: it with you, because you have a PhD in psychology
Speaker 1: and you're really interested in the extremes of human behavior
Speaker 1: and why people do what they do. And I feel
Speaker 1: like that's a big part of this too, because the
Speaker 1: missionaries and charity, it's an intense way of life.
Speaker 7: Yeah, when I first heard about this story, I thought
Speaker 7: there would be a lot of beautiful moments and also
Speaker 7: how life is an EMC is difficult at times, you know,
Speaker 7: But I guess what we ended up finding There was
Speaker 7: a lot more darkness than I realized. And you know,
Speaker 7: just hearing these women talk about even how years after
Speaker 7: leaving they were having nightmares about times as an MC,
Speaker 7: I don't know. It's just hard to grapple with all that.
Speaker 7: It's just hard to keep all the beautiful stories and
Speaker 7: all the dark ones in my head at once, and
Speaker 7: so I'm constantly changing how I feel about this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a lot more complicated than I thought early on.
Speaker 1: Maybe a week into Mary's time at the convent, she
Speaker 1: saw what it was like to be on the wrong
Speaker 1: end of a rule. It was the end of the day,
Speaker 1: so Mary took her nightly shower. Then she walked out
Speaker 1: of the bathing room.
Speaker 2: So I'm there with my bucket full of my dirty
Speaker 2: I'm wearing my night dress, and I walk out the door,
Speaker 2: and immediately standing right there so I can't even move,
Speaker 2: is Sister Carmeline. And then she says, sister Mary, you
Speaker 2: took the shower.
Speaker 8: I said, yes, sister, And she says.
Speaker 2: And you did it last night too. I heard the
Speaker 2: water falling. You took the shower, yes, sister, have you
Speaker 2: no shame? I mean, it was really She was getting
Speaker 2: very upset. She ended up calling me all sorts of
Speaker 2: names that I was vain and lazy and immodest. And
Speaker 2: I could not figure this out. What on earth had
Speaker 2: I done that was wrong? The water coming from the
Speaker 2: shower head was cold water. I hadn't broken poverty by
Speaker 2: turning on the hot one. I hadn't taken very long.
Speaker 2: I was really pretty quick about it. I couldn't understand.
Speaker 1: Earlier that day, Sister Carmeline had taught the Aspirans how
Speaker 1: to respond when corrected. You were supposed to stay silent,
Speaker 1: never talk back, and only speak when it's clear your
Speaker 1: superior is done then there was only one thing you
Speaker 1: could say, thank you, sister, Sorry sister.
Speaker 2: And so all the while my mind is racing, trying
Speaker 2: to figure out what on earth I've done wrong. At
Speaker 2: the same time, this instruction is coming back. Stand there, silent,
Speaker 2: like Jesus before Pilot, sister Carmeline had said. And even
Speaker 2: that morning that had caused a little confusion for me,
Speaker 2: because I knew before Pilot Jesus did not stand silent.
Speaker 2: Jesus and Pilot had a conversation, and Jesus talks about
Speaker 2: the truth. Pilot asks what is truth. There's this dialogue
Speaker 2: between them. Jesus was silent before King Herod when he
Speaker 2: was brought before him. But at the end I could
Speaker 2: only say those five words, thank you, sister, Sorry, sister.
Speaker 1: The next morning, Mary asked another sister what she done wrong.
Speaker 1: Emcees don't take showers. She said, instead, you're supposed to
Speaker 1: pour water over yourself with a tin can.
Speaker 2: And then at the end I just said thank you
Speaker 2: and just kind of tapped her on the arm, and
Speaker 2: she got so furious. She said, no, don't touch, don't touch. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, I can't do anything right.
Speaker 1: Mary started her training with eleven other women. Six months later,
Speaker 1: only she and one other aspirant remained. Each time a
Speaker 1: sister left, it felt abrupt. They'd only find out about
Speaker 1: it after the fact from their mistress, no explanation, just
Speaker 1: that they'd left. The remaining sisters didn't get to say goodbye,
Speaker 1: and they weren't allowed to talk about it. It made
Speaker 1: Mary wonder about her own vocation.
Speaker 2: Inside of me. There were all these questions about so
Speaker 2: what does it mean to be called? And how do
Speaker 2: you know if you're called?
Speaker 1: Mary prayed over and over to know whether she should
Speaker 1: go home or stay.
Speaker 2: And it just always came back to this, this tug,
Speaker 2: this poll to come and join Mother Teresa in fi
Speaker 2: following Jesus. It was like, Yes, this is what I
Speaker 2: was meant to do.
Speaker 3: This is it.
Speaker 1: Mary finished her aspirancy, so she was ready for the
Speaker 1: next step. And I should say there are a lot
Speaker 1: of steps to become an MC or any kind of nun.
Speaker 1: They each have different names and it can get confusing,
Speaker 1: but don't worry about it. I'll help you along the way. Basically,
Speaker 1: first you're in training, then for a while you take
Speaker 1: vows that last a year, and finally you take life
Speaker 1: long vows but Mary says, even before those final vows,
Speaker 1: Mother Teresa believed you were committed for life. Any urge
Speaker 1: to leave was the devil's temptation.
Speaker 2: Yes, in the book it says you take your vows
Speaker 2: for one year, but you know in your heart you
Speaker 2: do not tell Jesus yes for one year, you say
Speaker 2: yes for your entire life. I think Mother Teresa took
Speaker 2: everything to its most radical conclusion.
Speaker 1: It's a lot of pressure for anyone, especially a teenager.
Speaker 1: At this point, Mary was ready to become what's called
Speaker 1: a postulant, and for that she was sent to Rome.
Speaker 2: I arrived in Rome at the beginning of nineteen seventy eight.
Speaker 2: I was still nineteen years old.
Speaker 1: Rome was full of life and history. The Colosseum, the
Speaker 1: Roman Forum, the Pantheon, they were all nearby. At the time.
Speaker 1: The city was in turmoil too, fights in the streets,
Speaker 1: new divorce at abortion laws that led to protests. But
Speaker 1: Mary's life centered around the convent at the San Gregorio Church,
Speaker 1: A little world inside this bustling city. Across a gravel
Speaker 1: yard and through a gate was the convent, a block
Speaker 1: of low cement buildings. As a postulant, she still wore
Speaker 1: her own skirt and blouse. No sorry. Yet, whenever she
Speaker 1: felt overwhelmed, she remembered mother's words.
Speaker 2: You're here. That means God called you here, and now
Speaker 2: you must be faithful for life.
Speaker 1: After postulancy, Mary became a novice, and that meant it
Speaker 1: was time to take a new name. Once she picked
Speaker 1: for herself sister.
Speaker 2: Donata, Donata and freely given.
Speaker 1: There is also a ceremony. Mary and seven other sisters
Speaker 1: lined up in a chapel in front of Mother Teresa.
Speaker 1: One by one, Mother called the sisters by their new names.
Speaker 1: When Mary heard Mother Teresa call her new name, Sister Donata,
Speaker 1: it felt like a wave crested over her. It carried
Speaker 1: away Mary, the postulant who struggled with all the rules.
Speaker 2: And so I suppose in that since my old self
Speaker 2: was decreasing.
Speaker 1: Mother handed her new clothes. In a few moments, Mary's
Speaker 1: skirt and blouse would be gone, forever, replaced by the
Speaker 1: white sarres of the missionaries of charity. Mother had Mary
Speaker 1: kiss the habit. She said, let the world be nothing
Speaker 1: to you, and you nothing to the world. Then a
Speaker 1: sister handed Mother Teresa a pair of scissors to take
Speaker 1: the first snip of Mary's hair.
Speaker 2: Mother Teresa cut off just one little lock of hair
Speaker 2: and laid it on a tray.
Speaker 1: Another sister cut off Mary's ponytail. They were all singing
Speaker 1: this song, I.
Speaker 8: Have decided to follow Jesus. I have decided to follow Jesus.
Speaker 8: I have decided to follow Jesus.
Speaker 2: No turning back, no turning back. And we got dressed
Speaker 2: in our new clothes. And then as we were leaving
Speaker 2: to go back into the chapel, we were given that
Speaker 2: ponytail to hold into our hands, and we were told
Speaker 2: that this is like the bouquet of flowers that a
Speaker 2: young bride would carry to her wedding. And so we
Speaker 2: brought that ponytail, holding it in our hands, and laid
Speaker 2: it there in front of the altar in a little
Speaker 2: basket that was there.
Speaker 1: After the ceremony, Mother Teresa ate dinner with the new novices.
Speaker 1: Mother explained that cutting their hair was a sign of
Speaker 1: a sacred commitment to God. Once dinner was over, grand
Speaker 1: silence began, like every evening, no talking aloud until breakfast
Speaker 1: the next day. But that night something unusual happened, without
Speaker 1: anyone saying a word.
Speaker 2: One of the sisters began to pull each of us
Speaker 2: new novices aside, and that she signed to us that
Speaker 2: we should follow her, and we went into a back room.
Speaker 2: A fire was burning and so the room was quite hot.
Speaker 2: The ceremony wasn't over yet, no one spoke. There were
Speaker 2: four stools in the middle of the room. There were
Speaker 2: eight of us novices waiting there wondering what on earth
Speaker 2: was going on. And then the first four got motioned
Speaker 2: to sit on the stools.
Speaker 1: The professed sisters held scissors while Mary watched. They were
Speaker 1: moved to the novice's headpieces. They trammed what was left
Speaker 1: of their.
Speaker 2: Hair, cutting it shorter and shorter and shorter.
Speaker 1: Down to the scalp.
Speaker 2: The sisters were saying, Hail Mary, full of grace, and
Speaker 2: we were answering, Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us.
Speaker 2: And I remember one was had tears in her eyes
Speaker 2: as her hair was falling, and others were just kind
Speaker 2: of sitting there with their eyes shut as tight as
Speaker 2: they could. That was kind of kind of frightening to
Speaker 2: see it all happened all at once like that. It
Speaker 2: became very real.
Speaker 1: Then it was Mary's turn to sit on a stool.
Speaker 2: And cutting started. There's very little hair there and now
Speaker 2: there's less, and there's less, until there was really just
Speaker 2: just nothing, as close as you could get with a
Speaker 2: pair of scissors.
Speaker 1: After it was done, someone handed Mary a bucket of water,
Speaker 1: so she took it to the bathing room to wash herself.
Speaker 2: Just as I was finishing my bath, at this horrible
Speaker 2: smell came through the bathing room door. It was just
Speaker 2: like this acrid, awful, awful smell. And I followed that
Speaker 2: smell back into the room where our hair had been cut,
Speaker 2: and I saw there our novice mistress was tossing our
Speaker 2: ponytails into that fire, and just tossing our hair into
Speaker 2: the fire. And I could hear again that hymn that
Speaker 2: had been sung earlier that day. No turning back, No
Speaker 2: turning back, And it really felt that way.
Speaker 1: The Turning is written by Allen lance Lesser and Me.
Speaker 1: Our producers are Allen lance Luster and Emily Foreman. Our
Speaker 1: editor is Rob Rosenthal. Andrea Assuage is our digital producer.
Speaker 1: Fact checking by Andrea Lopez Cruzado. Special thanks to Amy Gaines,
Speaker 1: Sarah Olander, Catherine Joyce, Georgia Young, Beth Anne Macaluso, Travis
Speaker 1: Dunlap and Consulting producer Mary Johnson. Her memoir and Unquenchable
Speaker 1: Thirst provided inspiration for this series. President Reagan's remarks and
Speaker 1: presentation of the Medal of Freedom to Mother Teresa and
Speaker 1: her remarks in the Rose Garden on June twentieth, nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty five were used courtesy of Ronald Reagan Presidential Library
Speaker 1: under a Creative Commons license. Our executive producers are Jessica
Speaker 1: Alpert and John Farrati at Rococo Punch and Katrina Norvelle
Speaker 1: at iHeartMedia. Our theme music is by Matt Reid. For
Speaker 1: photos and more details on the series, follow us on
Speaker 1: Instagram at Rococo Punch. You can reach out via email
Speaker 1: to the Turning at rococopunch dot com I America Lance.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening.