Mother Teresa: A Biography (2 page)

Chapter 1

SKOPJE

Located in Macedonia, in a region that was formerly part of Albania, the city of Skopje was a bustling commercial center at the beginning of the twentieth century. The city, which straddles the Vardar River, rises approximately 800 feet above sea level. The summers are long and dry, the winters damp, cold, and foggy. Not large by contemporary standards, Skopje had a population of 25,000 at the turn of the century.

Founded during the third century B.C. by the Dardanians, early descen-dants of modern-day Albanians from Illyna in the western Balkan Peninsula and Thracians who lived north of ancient Greece, Skopje, then known as Skupi, later came under the control of the Romanians. By the sixth century, the area fell under the domination of a Slavic people known as the Beregheziti. It was they who gave the city its current name.

By the ninth century, owing in part to the weakness of the Byzantine Empire, with its capital in Constantinople (now Istanbul in modern Turkey), Albania came under the dominion of a succession of foreign powers including the Bulgarians, Norman crusaders from France, the Angevins of southern Italy, the Venetians, and the Serbs. The Serbian occupation that began in 1347 was especially hard, prompting huge numbers of Albanians to migrate to Greece and the Aegean islands.

A few decades later the Albanians confronted a new threat. The Turks expanded their empire, known as the Ottoman Empire, to include the Balkan Peninsula. Invading Albania in 1388, the Ottoman Turks, by the middle of the fifteenth century, had succeeded in occupying the entire kingdom. The Turks may have occupied the land, but they had less success governing the Albanian people. In 1443, Gjergj Kastrioti, also 2

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known as Skenderbeg, rallied the Albanian princes and drove the Turks out. For the next 25 years, operating out of a mountain stronghold, Skenderbeg frustrated every Turkish attempt to regain Albanian territory. His brave fight against one of the mightiest powers of the time won esteem throughout the Western world, as well as securing military and financial support from the Kingdom of Naples, the papacy, Venice, and Ragusa (a province in Sicily located on the southwest side). With Skenderbeg’s death in 1468, however, Albanian resistance gradually eroded, allowing the Turks to reoccupy the kingdom by 1506, again incorporating it into the Ottoman Empire. Even after his death, however, Skenderbeg’s legacy of resistance strengthened Albanian solidarity, kept alive a sense of national identity, and served as a source of inspiration in the ongoing struggle for national unity and independence.

A FORGOTTEN PEOPLE

The Turks established their dominion over Albania just as the Renaissance was beginning in Italy. Turkish domination of the Balkans cut the region off from contact and exchanges with Western Europe. As a consequence, Albania had no chance to participate in, or benefit from, the emphasis on human capabilities and accomplishments that characterized the Renaissance. Not only did the Balkans miss out on the Renaissance, but the Turks’ conquest of Albania also caused great suffering and vast destruction of the economy and commerce as well as traditional art and culture. To escape persecution, about one-fourth of the Albanian population fled to southern Italy, Sicily, and the northern part of the Dalmatian coast.

Countless others who remained converted to Islam, the religion of the Ottoman Empire.

Although the Turks ruled Albania for more than four hundred years, they failed to extend their authority throughout the kingdom. In the highland regions, the Turks exercised only a formal sovereignty. Beyond the reach of the government and the military, the Albanian highlanders refused to pay taxes, to serve in the army, or to surrender their weapons.

They did, however, attempt to appease the Turks by offering an annual tribute to Constantinople. Even those Albanians who did fall under Turkish sway proved difficult to manage. They rose in rebellion time and again against their conquerors.

To quell Albanian resistance, which was motivated as much by the defense of Christianity as by the desire for independence, the Turks initiated a systematic effort to convert Albanians to Islam. By the end of the sev-enteenth century, approximately two-thirds of Albanians had embraced S K O P J E

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Islam. Like their counterparts who had earlier converted, these men and women became Muslims not primarily from religious conviction but to escape the exploitation and violence directed toward Christians. Those who refused to convert, for example, endured a crushing tax burden from which Muslims were exempt. The so-called process of Islamization aggra-vated the religious fragmentation of Albanian society, which had began during the Middle Ages. The residue of this religious division persisted into the nineteenth century when leaders of the Albanian national movement used the rallying cry “the religion of Albanians is Albanianism” to overcome religious division and foster a sense of national unity.

By the middle of the nineteenth century the Ottoman Empire was weakening. Turkey, known as “The Sick Man of Europe,” was having trouble maintaining its hold on its many possessions. Sensing an opportunity to break free of Ottoman domination, the Albanians, along with other Balkan peoples, sought to attain their independence. In 1878, the leaders of the Albanian independence movement met in Prizren, a town in Kosovo, to found the Albanian League of Prizren. The league had two main goals. First, to unify Albanian territory, which the Turks had split into four provinces: Kosovo, Shkodra, Monastir, and Janina. Initially, the League of Prizren advocated not Albanian independence, but the creation of an autonomous Albanian state within the Ottoman Empire. Second, the league initiated a movement to promote Albanian cultural nationalism, emphasizing a distinctly Albanian language, literature, art, and education. Although the Turks suppressed the League of Prizren in 1881, the nationalist spirit of the league lived on. Inspired by the league, Albanian leaders met in the town of Monastir in 1908 to adopt a national alphabet. Based mostly on Latin, this alphabet supplanted several others, including Arabic and Greek, then in use. It is impossible to overestimate the value of an Albanian national language to the drive for national identity and independence.

In addition to repression, however, Turkish leaders promised to reform their administration of Albania to give the Albanians greater power to determine local affairs. When in 1908, however (the same year in which the Albanians adopted a national alphabet), a group called the Young Turks, bent on modernizing and strengthening the empire, seized control of the Turkish government, they ignored previous commitments to the Albanians. Frustrated at this turn of events, Albanians took up arms and in 1912 forced the Turks, in effect, to grant Albania near independence.

Alarmed at the prospect of an independent Albania, Albania’s Balkan neighbors, who had already made plans to partition the region, declared war on Turkey in October 1912. To prevent the annihilation of the coun-4

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try, Albanian delegates met in Vlorë and, on November 28, 1912, issued the Vlorë Proclamation in which they formally declared Albanian independence. In the midst of these ethnic, national, and religious conflicts, a child was born in Skopje who would one day try to overcome these differences in order, as she said, to do God’s work on earth.

THE FAMILY

One of the most ardent nationalists in Skopje was the independent building contractor and wholesale importer of food named Nikola Bojaxhiu. The son of a large and prosperous family that had long engaged in various commercial enterprises, Bojaxhiu moved from Prizren to Skopje because of its growing reputation as a trading center. An ambitious man, Bojaxhiu quickly bought a house in Skopje and in a short time acquired a number of additional properties. Among his first ventures was supplying medicine to one of the leading doctors in town. He later went into part-nership with an Italian businessman who traded in a wide variety of goods including oil, sugar, cloth, and leather.

By all accounts, Bojaxhiu was a more-than-capable businessman; he was fluent in five languages and had traveled extensively throughout Europe, the Near East, and North Africa. In addition, he was heavily involved in local politics, serving on the town council, and his contracting firm helped to build the first movie theater in Skopje. A patron of the arts, Bojaxhiu was also a faithful member of the local Roman Catholic Church.

In time, Bojaxhiu took a wife, marrying Dranafile Bernai in Prizren, the city in which the Albanian League was created and where Bojaxhiu had once lived. The couple soon returned to Skopje, settling into a spacious house with a large garden. Before long, Dranafile gave birth to three children: a daughter, Aga, was born in 1904; a son, Lazar, followed in 1907.

On August 26, 1910, the couple welcomed their second daughter and last child, Agnes Gonxha. A day later, on August 27, Gonxha, which means

“flower bud” in Albanian, was baptized at the local Catholic Church.

As an adult, Gonxha spoke little of her childhood, saying only that it had been pleasant. What information there is about her early life comes from her brother, Lazar, who, in describing their childhood together, also remembered it as carefree and peaceful. Although a strict discipli-narian, Nikola also took special delight in his children. Rarely did a day pass when they did not eagerly await his return home, and he often brought them trinkets as a token of his fatherly affection. Bojaxhiu also entertained his children, for he had a talent for storytelling, and recounted for them the sights he had seen and the people he had met on S K O P J E

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his travels. Then, too, the Bojaxhiu household was often crowded with the visitors who regularly stopped by to talk business or politics with Nikola.

Drana Bojaxhiu, or Nana Loke (“Mother Soul”), as the children called her, was a traditional Albanian housewife who looked after her husband and children. During the day, she cooked, cleaned, and mended clothing.

As soon as Nikola returned home, though, all work stopped. Drana put on a clean dress, combed her hair, and made sure the children were presentable to greet their father.

Like her husband, Drana was a stern taskmaster and had little patience with foolish behavior. One of the few stories that Gonxha told about her early life illustrated her mother’s attitude toward what she considered fri-volity. One evening as the children were chattering, their conversation grew sillier. Drana listened but said nothing. At last she left the room and turned off the main electric switch, plunging the house into darkness.

Gonxha concluded: “She told us that there was no use wasting electricity so that such foolishness could go on.”1 Drana passed this trait on to her youngest daughter; as an adult, Mother Teresa objected to wasted time and wasted words.

Agnes Gonxha resembled her mother in other ways. A bit plump like Drana, Agnes also had her mother’s oval face and distinctive nose; she was unmistakably her mother’s daughter. Her brother recalled that Gonxha was also generous and helpful, even though her behavior sometimes got her into trouble. Gonxha, for instance, helped Lazar to scale the cupboard and steal their mother’s jam or desserts. Needless to say, Drana did not approve.

FAITH AND FATHERLAND—FE Y ATDHE

All the Bojaxhiu children learned early the idea “Faith and Father-land,” or “Fe Y Atdhe.” This ideal became deeply embedded in their thinking, and remained strong throughout their childhood. The strong nationalist pride of the Albanian people, personified in their father, Nikola Bojaxhiu, became a constant in their lives. Lazar remembered his father telling him and his sisters never to forget whose children they were and from what background they came. Besides opening his home to political discussion, Nikola also provided financial assistance to the cause of Albanian independence. November 28, 1912, when Gonxha was only two years old, marked a joyous day in the Bojaxhiu household. On that day the Albanians declared their independence, and Nikola and other pa-triots played and danced well into the night.

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Nikola may have passed on to his children a sense of ethnic identity and nationalist pride; however, it was Drana who nurtured the children’s spiritual growth. Almost every evening, the Bojaxhiu family gathered in the living room to recite the rosary. Drana also oversaw the children’s evening prayers. A devout Catholic who went to Mass almost every day, Drana not only made sure her children practiced their religion but also incorporated it into their everyday lives. This was easier said than done.

The Roman Catholic community in Albania was small; fewer than 10

percent of the population declared themselves Roman Catholic. Although few in number, the Roman Catholic community in Skopje and throughout Albania was close-knit.

Not only did Drana practice religious devotion, she also believed deeply in the spiritual value of good works. She was always available to help those in need. In this practice, her husband supported her and Gonxha aided her. On any given day, Nikola left with Drana enough money to help the poor children or adults who came to the house. Commonly, the less fortunate not only received a hand out from the Bojaxhiu family, but also took meals with them, reminding the children that the needy were also part of their larger human family. “Some of them are our relations,” Drana once told her children, “but all of them are our people.”2

One of the strongest of Lazar’s memories is of his mother taking in a woman stricken with a tumor and nursing her back to health. Besides taking strangers into her home, Drana visited the poor in theirs, taking them food, money, and medicine. On these occasions, Gonxha often accompanied her mother, helping her as she made her way from family to family offering both spiritual and material comfort. Drana’s Christian charity offered a powerful example, helping to mold Gonxha’s spiritual life and to shape her destiny.

When the time came for the children to begin school, they attended classes held in Sacred Heart Church. For four years, the Bojaxhiu children studied in the Albanian language. At the fifth year, they began to learn in Serbo-Croatian. Upon leaving the church school, the children went to public schools where all the instruction was given in Serbo-Croatian.