My friend Patricia just stopped by. She brought me chocolate cake. She is my best friend. She is Catholic.

She knows nothing about this board or my experience here. But she said she saw this prayer and immediately thought of me.

You should hear what she is saying to me. What a comforter, what an encourager, and what a friend.

She says right now, "In the end... it was never between you and them anyway." She talked about me building... and others tearing down.

Again, she knows nothing of this... but this is God coming to visit me and speak to me through my very bestest friend, Patricia... my Catholic friend.

Here's Mother Teresa's Prayer...

If you have something nice and kind to say... please do so.

This was God... speaking to me... sent for this very hour.





~*~ Mother Teresa's Prayer ~*~

People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered;
...Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;
...Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies;
...Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;
...Be honest and frank anyway.

What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight;
...Build anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous;
...Be happy anyway.

The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow;
...Do good anyway.

Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;
...Give the world the best you've got anyway.

You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God;
It was never between you and them anyway.

Here's an article you might find interesting, Back.


Article about Mother Teresa


It is by grace you have been saved, not of works, lest any man should boast. Who gets the glory seems to come to mind.

FH, you know what bothers me about her whole premise? She says she did not "feel" his presence and therefore, this constitutes a "spiritual crisis" or vacuum of sorts. It appears as if she believes that God only exists in her life if she FEELS or perceives him through her SENSES. Do you get that impression?

Yes. That's one of the problems I also see with some other things in other denominations.

Did you, for example, ever wonder about the years of silence that Noah had between the command to build the Ark and the time it was time to get onboard the Ark?

Lots of years of silence.

Time is meaningless to God, and only has meaning to us finite creatures who think "time" is measured according to the "birth to death" length.

AGree. Mother Theresa's only "crisis" was her false expectation of the nature of faith. She was looking for a FEELING. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />

Back,

This wasn't written by Mother Theresa. I don't know if she read it and was as taken with it as many of us were...making it her prayer.

This was written by Kent M. Keith in 1968. Here's the link to the website about them... The Paradoxical Commandments


Doesn't take away a smidgen of support, love and caring your friend brings to you...

It's where my screenname comes from.

Thank you for reminding me with your post.

LA

LovingAnyway..that's a CHRISTIAN!!

That was awesome LA.

Thanks for sharing.

Great screen name choice.

<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I've read these things about Mother Teresa. I've read these things:

Psalm 88:14-18

14 Why, O LORD, do you reject me
and hide your face from me?

15 From my youth I have been afflicted and close to death;
I have suffered your terrors and am in despair.

16 Your wrath has swept over me;
your terrors have destroyed me.

17 All day long they surround me like a flood;
they have completely engulfed me.

18 You have taken my companions and loved ones from me;
the darkness is my closest friend.

(the "complaint"... of a child of God... not an unbeliever... in the book of Psalms)


Also:

Ecclesiastes 2:19-20
19 And who knows whether he will be a wise man or a fool? Yet he will have control over all the work into which I have poured my effort and skill under the sun. This too is meaningless. 20 So my heart began to despair over all my toilsome labor under the sun.

(the wisest person saying... all is meaningless... and his heart despairs...)


2 Corinthians 1:7-9
7And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort.

8We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. 9Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead.




When I read the book of Psalms and the entire Bible... I see the people of God in times of great despair.

Who knows what a person suffers going into Calcutta and giving their very life for the poorest among us.

Who knows what trials besiege a person.

I see the testimony of a life lived to serve the poorest of the poor... and taking their very hurt, brokenness, pain, and misery... into one's own heart... suffering with them.

What a place in Heaven there may be for those who have suffered so greatly for others... they themselves have suffered even the feelings as if they were forsaken.

Mark 15:34
And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?"—which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

Isaiah 49:13-15

13 Shout for joy, O heavens;
rejoice, O earth;
burst into song, O mountains!
For the LORD comforts his people
and will have compassion on his afflicted ones.

14 But Zion said, "The LORD has forsaken me,
the Lord has forgotten me."

15 "Can a mother forget the baby at her breast
and have no compassion on the child she has borne?
Though she may forget,
I will not forget you!


Even if believers say they feel as if the Lord has forsaken them and forgotten them... the Lord knows those who are His and He will never forget them.

Some suffer more than others in this life.

It is those most amazing to me... who, like Jesus,... choose suffering for the sake of others.

Suffering in the acts of charity... is not unfamiliar to those who give their all.

Such is the passion of Jesus Christ.

Well, mimi... when I can say "amen"... I'll say "amen".

Amen.

Mother Teresa is one of my most admired women. She lived the life of a follower of Jesus. She questioned her beliefs but acted on her faith. She was an example to all of us.

Hi believer,

She's on my "Top 10 Most Admired List".

Winston Churchill is there too... Abraham Lincoln... Martin Luther King Jr... people who have been used of God to do great things... to create or preserve freedom, liberty, and justice for all.

It's hard to look at Mother Teresa... and then look at the others... because... well, she just exemplified placing herself in poverty and suffering... and that's just so Jesus.

She gave such love...

Thanks for your post.

(and thanks to everyone for maintaining a nice, kind, pleasant, beneficial and uplifting thread...)

Oh... I was reminded. One of the greatest days in American history to me....

The day Martin Luther King, Jr. gave the "I have a dream" speech.

Here's the speech. It's so wonderful:

The Avalon Project at Yale Law School

I have a Dream by Martin Luther King, Jr; August 28, 1963


.
Delivered on the steps at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. on August 28, 1963

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of captivity.

But one hundred years later, we must face the tragic fact that the Negro is still not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. So we have come here today to dramatize an appalling condition.

In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check which has come back marked "insufficient funds." But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. So we have come to cash this check -- a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to open the doors of opportunity to all of God's children. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment and to underestimate the determination of the Negro. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny and their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.

And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.

Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.

I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day the state of Alabama, whose governor's lips are presently dripping with the words of interposition and nullification, will be transformed into a situation where little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls and walk together as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope. This is the faith with which I return to the South. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with a new meaning, "My country, 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim's pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring."

And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous peaks of California!

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!

Let freedom ring from every hill and every molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

"(and thanks to everyone for maintaining a nice, kind, pleasant, beneficial and uplifting thread...)"

Yes, and just put the others on IGNORE.