AM - Saturday, 18 October , 2003 08:26:08
Reporter: Geoff Thompson
HAMISH ROBERTSON: This Sunday, Mother Teresa of Calcutta will be beatified by John Paul the II at a ceremony at the Vatican.
But in India, there are still those who question the foundations of her progress towards sainthood.
Last year, the Vatican recognised the healing of an Indian woman's ovarian tumour as a miracle attributed to Mother Teresa.
But a doctor who treated the woman in Calcutta still claims that she was cured by medical intervention.
From New Delhi, our South Asia Correspondent Geoff Thompson now reports.
GEOFF THOMPSON: Mother Teresa will be beatified this Sunday, but another miracle will need to be attributed to her before she can proceed successfully through the investigative process towards sainthood.
The Mother’s case for sainthood must meet three stringent tests under church regulations before canonisation.
Her religious faith must be considered greater that normal, and she must be regarded as being responsible for two miracles.
Last year, the Vatican recognised the first miracle when a Bengali tribal woman, Monica Besra, was apparently cured of an ovarian tumour in 1998 after holding Mother Teresa’s picture against her body.
But not everybody agrees with the Vatican.
Probir Ghosh of the Indian Rationalist and Scientific Thinking Association is committed to exposing the tricks of Hindu Godmen and on this occasion, the alleged miracle of Mother Teresa.
He believes Mother Teresa was a saint in her dedication to the poor, but he doesn’t believe she worked miracles.
PROBIR GHOSH: The problem is this, that I know, you know and everyone knows that Mother Teresa was a great human being. She was a saint in her service to the poor. But it would be an insult to Mother Teresa if sainthood is connect with false claims of miracles.
GEOFF THOMPSON: Probir Ghosh’s opinion is based on the evidence of some doctors who examined Monica Besra.
Dr Ranjan Mustafi of the Balurghat District Hospital in Calcutta, is one of those physicians.
He says that Monica Besra had a tubercular cyst, and while she was praying to Mother Teresa, she was also receiving medical treatment for nine months, enough to cure her.
RANJAN MUSTAFI: So it is a medical remedy, not a Christian miracle or anything else. They are making the story just, because there is evidence that it was medically assist, so why are they making this miracle and giving her sainthood on this guesses I’m really astonished. So it is unlikely that it was a miracle that has cured the cyst.
GEOFF THOMPSPN: Dr Ranjan also believes Mother Teresa should be a saint, but not on the basis of a miracle he claims can be explained away by modern medicine.
In New Delhi this is Geoff Thompson for AM.
Source: ABC.net.au
|
