St. Teresa of Calcutta Prayer and Feast Day (Mother Teresa)

St. Teresa of Calcutta (1910–1997), known to the world as Mother Teresa, founded the Missionaries of Charity to serve “the poorest of the poor” and became a symbol of Christian love in our time. She was a woman of constant prayer: every day began with Mass and adoration, and her sisters still pray the prayers she loved. Below are two of them, Cardinal Newman’s prayer to radiate Christ, which her sisters pray in an adapted form after Communion, and the “flying novena” of Memorares she prayed in emergencies, together with prayers to St. Teresa of Calcutta for the poor and for those in spiritual darkness, Scripture, her life and her feast day.

The prayer to radiate Christ

Every day after Holy Communion, the Missionaries of Charity pray a prayer known as “Radiating Christ,” adapted from a meditation by St. John Henry Newman. This is Newman’s original text, from his Meditations and Devotions (1893):

Stay with me, and then I shall begin to shine as Thou shinest: so to shine as to be a light to others. The light, O Jesus, will be all from Thee. None of it will be mine. No merit to me. It will be Thou who shinest through me upon others. O let me thus praise Thee, in the way which Thou dost love best, by shining on all those around me. Give light to them as well as to me; light them with me, through me. Teach me to show forth Thy praise, Thy truth, Thy will. Make me preach Thee without preaching — not by words, but by my example and by the catching force, the sympathetic influence, of what I do — by my visible resemblance to Thy saints, and the evident fulness of the love which my heart bears to Thee.

The adapted version prayed by the sisters asks Jesus to help us “spread his fragrance” wherever we go, so that others may see not us but him. Its message was the program of Mother Teresa’s life: to preach Christ without preaching, by love.

The “flying novena”

When she needed help quickly, Mother Teresa did not wait nine days. She prayed what she called a “flying novena” or “express novena”: the Memorare nine times in a row for her intention, and a tenth time in thanksgiving, trusting that Our Lady would answer. The Memorare, in the translation used on this site:

Remember, O most gracious Virgin Mary,
that never was it known that anyone who fled to thy protection,
implored thy help, and sought thy intercession, was left unaided.
Inspired with this confidence, I fly unto thee, O Virgin of virgins, my Mother.
To thee I come; before thee I stand sinful and sorrowful.
O Mother of the Word Incarnate, despise not my petitions,
but in thy mercy hear and answer me. Amen.

See the Memorare page for its history.

A prayer to St. Teresa of Calcutta

Written for this page:

St. Teresa of Calcutta, you heard Jesus say “I thirst”
and spent your life quenching his thirst for love in the poorest of the poor.
Pray for me, that I may see Jesus in everyone I meet,
do small things with great love, and never refuse him anything.
Obtain for me the grace I ask: (name your intention). Amen.

A prayer for the poor and the forgotten

St. Teresa, you picked up the dying from the streets
so that they could die knowing they were loved.
Pray for the hungry, the homeless, the lonely and the unwanted.
Open my eyes to the poor in my own family and neighborhood,
and make my hands ready to serve. Amen.

This prayer was written for this page. See the works of mercy.

A prayer in spiritual darkness

After her death, her letters revealed that for almost fifty years she had felt no consolation in prayer, while continuing to love and serve with joy. She is a friend to everyone who feels far from God.

St. Teresa, you walked in darkness and kept smiling for Jesus.
When I cannot feel God’s presence, help me to keep believing, praying and loving.
Let me offer my emptiness to Jesus, who thirsts for me,
and trust that his light will come. Amen.

This prayer was written for this page.

A prayer for the dying

St. Teresa, pray for (name), who is dying.
Let him (her) feel loved and not alone,
and bring him (her) safely home to God. Amen.

This prayer was written for this page. See the prayers for the dying.

Scripture for St. Teresa of Calcutta

The words “I thirst” are painted beside the crucifix in every chapel of the Missionaries of Charity:

Afterwards, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled, said: I thirst.

The Gospel she lived:

Then shall the king say to them that shall be on his right hand: Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
For I was hungry, and you gave me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took me in:
Naked, and you covered me: sick, and you visited me: I was in prison, and you came to me.
Then shall the just answer him, saying: Lord, when did we see thee hungry, and fed thee; thirsty, and gave thee drink?
And when did we see thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and covered thee?
Or when did we see thee sick or in prison, and came to thee?
And the king answering, shall say to them: Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me.

The life of St. Teresa of Calcutta

Anjezë Gonxhe Bojaxhiu was born on August 26, 1910, in Skopje, then in the Ottoman Empire, to an Albanian Catholic family. At eighteen she joined the Sisters of Loreto in Ireland and in 1929 was sent to India, where she took the name Teresa, after St. Thérèse of Lisieux, and taught for many years at a girls’ school in Calcutta (Kolkata).

On September 10, 1946, on a train to Darjeeling, she received what she called “a call within a call”: Jesus asked her to serve him in the poorest of the poor. In 1948 she left the convent, put on a simple white sari with a blue border, and began to work in the slums. On October 7, 1950, the Missionaries of Charity were established in Calcutta. In 1952 she opened a home for the dying, Nirmal Hriday, and later homes for abandoned children, lepers and people with AIDS. The congregation spread across the world.

She received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979. She died in Calcutta on September 5, 1997. Pope St. John Paul II beatified her in 2003, and Pope Francis canonized her in Rome on September 4, 2016.

Feast day and patronage

Feast day: September 5, the anniversary of her death. A novena can run from August 27 to September 4.
Patron of: the Missionaries of Charity and all who serve the poor; she is also a co-patron of the Archdiocese of Calcutta, with St. Francis Xavier.
Symbols: the white sari with blue stripes, a rosary, and a child or a poor person in her arms.

Frequently asked questions

When is St. Teresa of Calcutta’s feast day?

September 5, the day she died in 1997.

What prayer did Mother Teresa say every day?

Besides Mass, the Liturgy of the Hours, the Rosary and an hour of adoration, she and her sisters prayed “Radiating Christ,” adapted from Cardinal Newman, after Communion. In emergencies she prayed a “flying novena” of nine Memorares.

Why is Mother Teresa called St. Teresa of Calcutta?

Because she was canonized in 2016. Saints are usually named after the place where they lived and served; she worked in Calcutta (Kolkata) for almost seventy years.

Is St. Teresa of Calcutta the same as St. Thérèse of Lisieux?

No. Mother Teresa took her religious name from St. Thérèse of Lisieux, the “Little Flower,” a French Carmelite who died in 1897. See the St. Thérèse prayer and the St. Teresa of Avila prayer.

More prayers

Texts and sources

Newman’s prayer: John Henry Newman, Meditations and Devotions (London: Longmans, Green, 1893), “Jesus the Light of the Soul,” section 3, public domain (archive.org).
Memorare: The Little Book of the Most Holy Child Jesus (1876), public domain (Wikisource).
Scripture: John 19:28; Matthew 25:34–40, Douay-Rheims Bible (Challoner), public domain.
The other prayers were written for this page.