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The figure of Mother Teresa is the only link that unites people, even when they do not know each other beforehand. Everywhere else, in politics, in business, in sports, people come together by common affinities or by certain interests, while to be close to Saint Mother Teresa you didn't need to have any special preferences, least of all to be rich or famous...
In modern history, Saint Mother Teresa represents the most emblematic figure who unites the universality of human virtue and divine holiness. Being between the human and the divine, St. Mother Teresa tried to show us that sacrifice, awareness and faith coexist deep in human nature, as three components that make the human being special.
From the many studies that have been done on the life and work of Saint Mother Teresa, it results that her commitment was not simply charity, as some authors mistakenly treat it, but sacrifice, because sacrifice, according to Saint Mother Teresa, represents the highest level in which there is the human consciousness to make others happy by giving up personal happiness.
Saint Mother Teresa built this whole system of human and divine values, having as a model her family in Skopje, as an educational "laboratory" where this system was created. Coming from a distant suburb, such as the Skopje of her childhood and youth, with a wide range of religious, ethnic and linguistic diversity, Saint Mother Teresa carried the fabric of the human and the divine throughout the planet, transforming the states of spiritual gloom in gardens of optimism and hope. Consequently, she was more involved in the spiritual recovery than the material of man, because Saint Mother Teresa considered that a full soul makes a person richer than a full pocket.
In order to better understand and study this system of human and divine values of Saint Mother Teresa, we, as the Institute of Spiritual and Cultural Heritage of Albanians, in 2020 founded the Department for the study of the spiritual heritage of Gonxhe Bojaxhi - Mother Teresa, the only of this kind in the region and beyond. The establishment of this Department was accompanied by the completion of the personnel and legal infrastructure, in order for our research and scientific work to have the highest quality support.
Inspired by the inclusive dimension that the figure of Saint Mother Teresa embodied, we as an Institute and as a Department designed two objectives, which we tried to integrate into our scientific and publishing activity.
The first - by approaching the figure of Saint Mother Teresa, we aimed to increase institutional care for her, which would close all the paths of misuse and misinterpretation of her name and work and would open the paths of affirmation under the guise of a special status, which would be treated as a national brand of our state. For this, we also prepared an elaboration, which we addressed to the highest official authorities, where we requested that the figure of Saint Mother Teresa be protected by law and that it enjoy all the attributes of a national asset that would attract the attention of visitors from the country and the world. With this, we wanted Skopje, as the birthplace of Gonxhe Bojaxhiu - Mother Teresa, to become a pilgrimage center for all those who admired the figure of this great woman.
Second - within the Department for the study of the spiritual heritage of Gonxhe Bojaxhiu - Mother Teresa, we took some concrete steps in the philosophical, theological and sociocultural treatment of this figure. For four years in a row, we have organized the scientific-cultural manifestation "Drita e Gonxha", an activity that begins on August 26 and ends on September 5, the dates that coincide with the birth and death of the Blessed Mother Teresa, as a long span of time with events and ideas that directly unfold the multidimensionality of her figure. Authors and researchers, writers and artists from the country and the region participate in this manifestation, who start from Skopje, continue to Pristina, Letnica, Tirana and travel a long journey, encouraging wide public attention for some of the vital stations of Saint Mother Teresa.
Also, when we talk about the second objective of this Department, we should also mention the rich publishing activity dedicated mainly to the figure of Saint Mother Teresa, but also to her Catholic-Albanian community in Skopje, such as the work on "Albanian Catholic Families from Skopje", a spiritual and historical testament that speaks of the history and actuality of this community, which in the beginning to the middle of the last century was a strong candle that highlighted the cultural, religious and spiritual values of these families, but with the passage of time, unfortunately, this candle began to fade terribly, due to the almost massive exodus of Albanian Catholics from Skopje. A modest contribution to preserving the memory and respect for this community, every year, specifically every December 23, in our Institute we organize Catholic Christmas in the Albanian language, as a celebration that brings together the few families that are left in Skopje. therefore, the current situation of Albanian Catholics in Skopje requires a more serious approach from the highest hierarchies of the Catholic world, so that these descendants of Saint Mother Teresa of Skopje are not forced to hear mass in their native language in Pristina or elsewhere outside North Macedonia.
The institutional and scientific approach to the figure of Saint Mother Teresa would be deficient if we do not understand the importance of this figure in spreading sublime human and spiritual values to people whom she did not know before, did not know their names, knew what religion or nation they belonged to, but knew that loneliness is the greatest wound of humanity and loneliness, as St. Mother Teresa taught us, has neither religious nor national affiliation, but it is an invisible part of the person who seeks a warm hand when others forget you.
Starting precisely from these humane and spiritual causes of Saint Mother Teresa, we as an Institute tried to present in all our scientific and publishing activity the model of these causes through which she taught us to overcome the walls of our national egos , religious and racial.
The figure of Mother Teresa is the only link that unites people, even when they do not know each other beforehand. Everywhere else, in politics, in business, in sports, people come together by common affinities or by certain interests, while to be close to Saint Mother Teresa you didn't need to have any special preferences, least of all to be rich or famous. All the wealth and fame of Saint Mother Teresa was drawn in the form of a smile on her face, because she was aware that people more than anything else needed a sincere smile.
The study of the life and work of Saint Mother Teresa requires a colossal commitment and efforts are never enough to treat her figure in many dimensions. Although hundreds and thousands of literary and musical works have been written and just as many visual and sculptural works have been made, Saint Mother Teresa continues to be an inexhaustible source of inspiration for creators of all fields.
Now that we are living in the era of information technology, it is close to mind that the multidimensionality of the figure of Saint Mother Teresa is carried over to the many projections of this technology, including Artificial Intelligence, as a favor that exceeds the classical way of presenting her to the public. .
In the not-so-distant future, the life and work of Saint Mother Teresa, from childhood to the last years of her life, will be part of the technological projections within the Institute of Spiritual and Cultural Heritage of Albanians in Skopje. , where through Artificial Intelligence she will not only become closer to the public, but will also produce more ideas for her figure to be included in the process of communication and civic interaction, as an agora that relativizes differences and aligns worldviews.
(Speech delivered at the "World Changers Balkan Summit", organized on October 12, 2024 in Skopje)
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