Nuns make exception, watch TV for Mother

KOLKATA: Having stayed away from television sets all their lives, hundreds of nuns of the Missionaries of Charity made an exception on Sunday when they remained

KOLKATA: Having stayed away from television sets all their lives, hundreds of nuns of the Missionaries of Charity made an exception on Sunday when they remained glued to the screens that beamed Mother Teresa’s canonisation ceremony in the Vatican.

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At the Mother House, headquarters of the congregation and home of the Saint, three large TV screens were brought from outside so that nuns from different homes and churches could gather at one place and watch the sainthood ceremony.

The entrance to the house was bedecked with blue and white blossoms, the colours that Saint Teresa chose for the sarees to be worn by the nuns of her order. “We do not have TV or mobile phones here. Only when we have to screen some documentary for visitors, then a temporary screen is put up,” one of the nuns at the Mother House said.

Two of the TV screens were open to visitors on the ground floor of the three-storeyed building while another one was kept upstairs for the nuns.

There were cheers as Pope Francis was seen on the giant screens arriving for the celebrations at the St Peter’s Basilica in a ceremonial procession.

The Kolkata Municipal Corporation put up a fourth screen at a pandal, close to the Mother House for general public and media.

The nuns said this was one of those rare occasions when they watched TV. “We remain focused on the service of the poor and staying away from such pleasures of life is an integral part of the congregation. But this is an exceptional case. We all very overjoyed. She is our mother and so we have to watch this,” they said.

To this day, none of them own or use a mobile phone. “We don’t need phones and TV. We have landline phone and that is enough,” another nun ,who was busy cleaning rainwater inside the quarters, said.

The honour came a day before the nun’s 19th death anniversary, and only nine days after her 107th birthday.