Missionary of Charity Father Brian Kolodiejchuk knows more about Mother Teresa than anyone else.

He is postulator for the sainthood cause of the founder of his order, the Missionaries of Charity. Father Kolodiejchuk last year published The Soul of Mother Teresa: Hidden Aspects of Her Interior Life, a study drawn largely from letters she wrote to her spiritual directors. The work reveals a side of the smiling nun that many were unaware of.

Register correspondent Sabrina Arena Ferrisi spoke to Father Kolodiejchuk in Rome on the eve of the Oct. 19 beatification of Mother Teresa.

How did you become a Missionary of Charity priest?

I'm from Winnipeg, which is smack in the middle of Canada. My family belongs to the Ukrainian [Catholic] rite. My sister joined the Missionaries of Charity in 1976 as a nun and during the next year, she moved to Rome. After a one-year pre-novitiate, in May 1977 she was going to enter the novitiate [in Rome]. My whole family decided to go and visit. There, we met Mother Teresa. I was 21.

We were going to morning Mass every day. Mother Teresa knew I was the brother of one of her nuns. On June 2, the feast of the Sacred Heart, they founded the Missionaries of Charity Contemplative Brothers.

They had a special Mass for six new brothers, where Mother pinned crosses on them. At the end, all of us were leaving and she turned to me and said, “I want to pin a cross on you, too.” I didn't answer.

The next day, I asked her what she meant by that. And she invited me to join the brothers.

Had you ever thought about a religious vocation prior to this?

Previously, I had been in the seminary in Canada — the Ukrainian Rite. Before I left for Rome, I had decided that it was not my vocation. In typical Mother Teresa fashion, she wanted me to stay immediately. But I had to go back to Canada because of various things I had to take care of. I returned to Rome in the fall. So basically, my sister and I were in Rome at the same time, from 1977 to 1979.

Two years later, I went back to Canada to get a master's degree in philosophy. I still wanted to be a priest. I met an Oblate of the Virgin Mary, Father Joseph Langford, who asked me if I'd be interested in the priesthood for the Missionaries of Charity.

The Missionaries of Charity priesthood didn't exist yet — they were trying to get permission from the Vatican. I decided to stay in Rome and study theology at the Angelicum. But the Missionaries of Charity still hadn't gotten permission.

In your work as postulator, what have you discovered about Mother Teresa?

Mother Teresa was born in Skopje to an ethnic-Albanian family. Her father died, it was assumed, by poisoning. He was involved in the Albanian national cause.

He went to a meeting and when he came back, he died. Mother Teresa was 8 or 9 years old. After that she was left with her mother, her older sister, Age, and brother, Lazar.

Her mom was the strongest influence in her life, in addition to the parish. Their house was very near [the church] — right around the corner. In that setting, the parish was the center of community spiritual and cultural life. Albanian Catholics constituted 10% of the population. The majority were Albanian Muslims. The parish had youth activities, devotions and prayers.

Can you tell me anything about Pope John Paul II's relationship with Mother Teresa?

The Pope and Mother Teresa were close. She'd visit him whenever she was in Rome and consult with him. She wanted to be in harmony with him. And they were on the same wavelength. He agreed to waive the norm of five years [to begin working on her cause for sainthood] not just because of the friendship but because of her person. He told her to go speak to audiences that he couldn't go to.

What was Mother Teresa's spiritual life like?

From 1946 to 1947, she experienced an intense union with God. In 1949, when the [Missionaries of Charity] work began, her interior state changed. She experienced the “darkness.” The classic symptoms of the dark night — feeling rejected by God but feeling intense longing, thirst for God.

How long did this last?

This lasted the rest of her life. This darkness is the single most heroic thing about her life. She was having no consolation. She didn't feel correspondence with God. She only revealed this to a few spiritual directors. She was united to Jesus on the cross. His loneliness; “My God, My God, why have you abandoned me?”

The words “I thirst” are in the constitution of the Missionaries of Charity Congregation. The aim is to satiate the infinite thirst of Jesus on the cross for love and souls. As the work expanded in the West, Mother Teresa said that the greatest poverty was being unloved, unwanted, uncared for.

Just like she lived this physical poverty, to be in solidarity with the poor, she was also experiencing an internal spiritual poverty — like so many do. This was a trial of faith, like St. Teresa said, “Like eating at the table of sinners”

What was the miracle that brought about this beatification?

A Hindu woman named Monica was suffering from tuberculosis and a tumor growing in her stomach in 1998. She was at death's door. On Sept. 5, the first anniversary of Mother Teresa's death, the Missionaries of Charity superior took a miraculous medal and put it on this woman's stomach and said nine Memorares. She prayed to Mother Teresa to please help Monica.

Monica fell asleep and when she woke up found that her stomach was flat.

What is special about this Beatification?

We chose as a theme the words of Jesus to Mother Teresa in an inner locution in 1947: “Come be my light.” Mother Teresa always said that love, to be true, has to hurt. In this life, you are the “law of the gift,” as the Pope calls it. Love involves the cross. It involves suffering in some way. Mother Teresa was a light for being faithful. In the same way, wherever we are, we can be a light. This beatification is for us, not for Mother Teresa, to inspire us to live our vocation.

Sabrina Arena Ferrisi writes from Rome.