by Chris Klontz (this is the author, he is evaluating the book DomKen cited) I am posting it simply because his one-sided POV made me so mad. But he could have easily looked it up himself, had he been very interested.
One POV:
Because of all of Mother Teresa’s extensive media
coverage, people lose sight of what she really wants to be seen
as: “A little pencil of God” who only wants to serve the
poorest of poor. Mother Teresa even said herself, “If I got to
heaven, it will be on account of all this publicity; I hate it. Why
all this fuss about us? Others do the same work as we do. Do it
perhaps better. Then why single us out?” (Le Joly 299).
The media has so extensively covered Mother Teresa’s work with
the poor in Calcutta that people tend to lose sight of the other
charitable work other missions are doing, particularly in India.
There are a few thousand registered charities in Calcutta, some
much larger than the Missions of Charity, yet Mother Teresa’s
mission arguably gets more coverage than all the other missions
in Calcutta combined.
Calcutta’s largest charity by far is the
Ramakrishna Mission. The Ramakrishna Mission cares for
about 10 times as many people as the Missionaries of Charity
(Chatterjee 283), yet receives roughly 84 times less media
coverage.2 This massive unbalance in media coverage, which
turns Mother Teresa into a celebrity, leaves major charities
largely invisible to the philanthropic donations from generous
individuals and organizations.
One might think that all this media coverage is good
because it brings the world to realization of the troubles in third
world countries and compels people to donate money to the
less fortunate. This is an admirable argument, but it has one
flaw: the money people donate should be spread amongst all
the charities. There were times when Mother Teresa had so
much money that she didn’t know what to do with it all **and
requested for a “Temporary halt to contributions until we have
used up what we have” (Chitkara 15). A German newspaper
claimed that “Excessive support to a single charity leading to
the needs of thousands of others being forgotten was probably
behind the request” (Chitkara 16).
Other charities of Calcutta
could really put to use some of the unused money that has been
offered to mother Teresa. Other large charities that few have
heard of like the Child in Need Institute (CINI) and the Bharat
Sevadhram Sangha both could use the money that Mother
Teresa had available to her. Most charities of India offer
different services, and the Missionaries of Charity offer very
few practical services that cater to the needs of India’s people (note: This is an opinion, and certainly differs from the second post source citation, below this one).
For instance in times of natural disaster and wars, the
Missionaries of Charity were either absent (note: not true in every case) from or playing a
minor part in the effort to restore order while other charities
were heavily battling for the needs of the Indian populace
(Chatterjee 280).
Other charities excel in other areas (Note: So what? Why should they not?)that
Mother Teresa’s order lacks in, such as providing medical care
and education (note: Maybe they do it better - but she does this work too. If they do, she already said she thought so too).
It is the heroification of Mother Teresa that makes her
virtually immune to criticism, and the small amount of
criticism that she does get is hurriedly dismissed.
The personalized image of Mother Teresa created by the media
causes us to overlook the actual work she is doing and causes
us to not recognize the perhaps more effective work other
notable charities are doing to help the people of India (Note: Maybe. This doesn't make the work she does useless. Not by a long shot).
Because of this, there are times when Mother Teresa’s mission gets more
monetary support than they can handle, while other worthy
charities are deprived of financial support. Note: Like this is her fault? She started her own order. Why would it surprise anyone that is her mission?
It is through this process of media distorting reality, defined as
sentimentalization that causes us to not realize that the wellbeing
of the poor is being jeopardized by our biased views of
Mother Teresa (I can agree with this, but think the author seems partly like an incurable idealist).
