It is always tempting to see the saints, not as individuals with the very human struggles that afflict us all, but surrounded with an aura of sanctity, symbolised by a halo. This does the saints a disservice as it dehumanises them; it does us a disservice as they seem too far removed from our own lives for us to imitate them.
David Scott's The Love That Made Saint Teresa is refreshing for this reason. He ponders aspects of the life of Mother Teresa of Calcutta (as she is generally known) which are often glossed over, such as the 18 years she spent in the privileged surroundings of the Loreto Convent in Calcutta, during which she barely mentioned the misery beyond the convent gates. “Her conversion to the poor came slowly,” he suggests.
