Short description
In a searching examination of the Teresa cult, Christopher Hitchens recasts our relationship with Mother Teresa of Calcutta. He concludes that, far from being heaven's agent on Earth, Mother Teresa is one of hell's angels.
Long description
Recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, feted by Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher and the House of Windsor, and eulogized throughout the world's media, Mother Teresa of Calcutta has entered that most select of sanctums: the house of living saints. But, as Christopher Hitchens argues, all is not as it seems in the canonization of Saint Teresa. In a searching examination of the Teresa cult, Hitchens recasts our relationship with Mother. He recounts her cosy relations with unsavoury oligarchies throughout the Third World, from the Duvalier dynasty in Haiti to Union Carbide in India. He reports on her consistent mission to the rich, including corrupt tycoons and convicted frauds. He spotlights her role as a propagandist for the most extreme views on abortion and contraception, details her dubious "special relationship" with claims of miraculous and supernatural apparitions, exposes her authoritarian rule over her acolytes, and outlines her megalomaniacal plans to found a new religious order, The Missionary Multinational. How should we relate to Mother? As an essential salve to the conscience of the rich West, or an expert PR machine for the Catholic Church? Christopher Hitchens is the author of "Hostage to History: Cyprus from Ottoman to Kissinger", "Prepared for the Worst", "Blood, Class and Nostalgia: Anglo American Ironies", "International Territory: Official Utopia and the United Nations" (with Adam Bartos) and "For The Sake of Argument: Essays and Minority Reports".
Review
Arguably this was the most controversial book of 1995 - a devastating critique of the life and achievements of Mother Teresa. Hitchens shows, with incontrovertible evidence, that while Mother Teresa may or may not have been saintlike, she was naive to the point of cruelty ('comforting' a dying cancer patient in terrible pain, she asserted that 'Jesus is kissing you'. 'Then I wish he'd stop,' said the patient.) The author asserts Mother Teresa accepted money unquestioningly from extremely dubious sources and positively refused to spend it on proper medical treatment or drugs, preferring to use it to forward the fight against birth control. A violently interesting and provocative essay. (Kirkus UK)