Teresa @ MindSay 
The following is a story from CBS of mother Teresa and how she lost her faith. I find it inspiring that even though she had many doubts she continued with the work that was before her. Even though she had every excuse to walk away from the church, Calcutta and all it's poverty she continued to stay and help the people.
Though I am not a "believer", I believe in mother Teresa and the work she did. She is an inspiration!
I'm sure many of you have doubts from time to time. I had so many I lost my faith completely. But unlike me, mother Teresa stayed on the path. Was it for God? Was it for mankind? Was she a "saint"?Or was it all she knew to do? What ever her reason, it must have taken great courage to continue on. To live your whole life in poverty doing hard , selfless work even when you were no longer sure of a "God" or a "payoff" at the end.
Rest in peace Teresa!
(CBS) In life, Mother Teresa was an icon — for believers — of God's work on Earth. Her ministry to the poor of Calcutta was a world-renowned symbol of religious compassion. She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
In a rare interview in 1986, Mother Teresa told CBS News she had a calling, based on unquestioned faith.
"They are all children of God, loved and created by the same heart of God," she said.
But now, it has emerged that Mother Teresa was so doubtful of her own faith that she feared being a hypocrite, reports CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips.
In a new book that compiles letters she wrote to friends, superiors and confessors, her doubts are obvious.
Shortly after beginning work in Calcutta's slums, the spirit left Mother Teresa.
"Where is my faith?" she wrote. "Even deep down… there is nothing but emptiness and darkness... If there be God — please forgive me."
Eight years later, she was still looking to reclaim her lost faith.
"Such deep longing for God… Repulsed, empty, no faith, no love, no zeal," she said.
As her fame increased, her faith refused to return. Her smile, she said, was a mask.
"What do I labor for?" she asked in one letter. "If there be no God, there can be no soul. If there be no soul then, Jesus, You also are not true."
"These are letters that were kept in the archbishop's house," the Rev. Brian Kolodiejchuk told Phillips.
The letters were gathered by Rev. Kolodiejchuk, the priest who's making the case to the Vatican for Mother Teresa's proposed sainthood. He said her obvious spiritual torment actually helps her case.
"Now we have this new understanding, this new window into her interior life, and for me this seems to be the most heroic," said Rev. Kolodiejchuk.
According to her letters, Mother Teresa died with her doubts. She had even stopped praying, she once said.
The church decided to keep her letters, even though one of her dying wishes was that they be destroyed. Perhaps now we know why.
© MMVII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.
This little girl was walking along the beach. She saw that each time the tide receded, lots of starfish were grounded on the shore. Left alone and unattended, the starfish would dry up and die when the sun's heat bore down on them. The little girl knew this. She picked up the starfish on the shore and threw them back to the sea.
An old man happened to pass by. He saw what she was doing. He asked her if she knew there were hundreds of starfish left stranded on the shore each time the tide retutned to the sea. He asked her if she ever gave it a thought that what she was doing was actually hopeless and useless and was of no help to the starfish?
She said, "I don't know about about the rest of the starfish, but for every starfish in my hand, it would make all the difference in the world."
The story is somewhat similar to the one about Mother Teresa and her company of Sisters of Mercy. They had set up a nursing home in Calcutta, India where they could care for the sick, the hungry, the abandoned, the unwashed and dying human outcasts found in the streets of Calcuttta. Seeing the magnitude of their efforts, a curious bystander told Mother Teresa of the hundreds upon hundreds of human derelicts littering the roads and bypaths of the country. He asked Mother Teresa, "How are you going to care for all of them?" Her answer was simple. "One by one." she said.
Believe it or not: God does not expect us mortals to do extraordinary things. Only ordinary things in an extraordinary way, like to love our neighbor as we love ourseles. We are cautioned to live one day at a time for sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. The Chinese have a saying: "The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step." A single step. One day at a time. No hurry. Even the sun takes its time crossing the sky every day on its way from East to West.
And this brings to mind Mr. Steve Vaught. Forty years old, a resident of Oceanside, California, USA, happily married with two lovable kids. One day he made up his mind to something about his condition: he was much too fat: 480 pounds. In fact, his being obese was the one thing in his life that made him unhappy. This is how he said: "I am not happy because I am fat and being fat makes everday unhappy."
He decided to shed hia excess weight, not by going on a diet, not by exercising in a gym, not by weight-loss surgery. Nope. He planned to walk the distance from his home in Oceanside, California to New York City, a distance of approximately 3,000 miles.
With his family's blessings, he started out for New York on that single step from his home at Oceanside, CA on April 10, 2005. He arrived in Manhattan, New York City on May 9, 2006, about 100 pounds lighter. Along the way, he slept in tents and motels, ate less than nourishing food, went through 15 pairs of shoes, more than 30 pairs of socks and six backpacks. He is most thankful to dozens of supporters in 26 states.
He said, "I took that walk to lose weight and to regain my life. I could buy another car (he sold his car to finance the journey,)I could buy another property (he sold his property for the same reason), but I cannot buy another life. That's the most precious thing in life that cannot be bought at any price."
If you wish to know more about the walk and what happened along the way, you can go to Mr. Vaught's website http://www.TheFatManWalking.com. It's full of insight and worth your time.
