Mommie Dearest

Always a trenchant critic of Mother Teresa, it is unsurprising that Christopher Hitchens does not think highly of her recent beatification. But why does he think that this is such a bad move for the Roman Catholic Church?

Hitchens writes for Slate:

What is so striking about the "beatification" of the woman who styled herself "Mother" Teresa is the abject surrender, on the part of the church, to the forces of showbiz, superstition, and populism. ... It used to be that a person could not even be nominated for "beatification," the first step to "sainthood," until five years after his or her death. This was to guard against local or popular enthusiasm in the promotion of dubious characters. The pope nominated MT a year after her death in 1997. It also used to be that an apparatus of inquiry was set in train, including the scrutiny of an advocatus diaboli or "devil's advocate," to test any extraordinary claims.

As for the "miracle" that had to be attested, what can one say? Surely any respectable Catholic cringes with shame at the obviousness of the fakery. A Bengali woman named Monica Besra claims that a beam of light emerged from a picture of MT, which she happened to have in her home, and relieved her of a cancerous tumor. Her physician, Dr. Ranjan Mustafi, says that she didn't have a cancerous tumor in the first place and that the tubercular cyst she did have was cured by a course of prescription medicine. Was he interviewed by the Vatican's investigators? No.

Mother Teresa was fanatical and fundamentalist in her faith - she opposed the reforms of the Second Vatican Council, for example, arguing against any need for doctrinal reforms. Pope John Paul II has sped up the process of beatification and canonization in the hopes of making her a saint while he still lives. Why? Because her beliefs are what he would like to hold up as a model for all Catholics - and that is only likely to damage Catholicism in the long-run.

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• Roman Catholicism
• Popes
• Vatican Council II