4. Mother Teresa Used her Status to Promote Hardline Catholic dogma
Mother Teresa was a strong anti-abortion advocate and opposed the use of contraception. Christopher Hitchens accused Mother Teresa of “operating as a roving ambassador” of the “highly-politicized papacy” of John Paul II. Hitchens claims that when Mother Teresa visited London in 1988 she tried to influence the British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher to introduce a bill to limit abortion in Britain.
During her acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979, Mother Teresa referred to “abortion” as the “greatest destroyer of peace today.” She added, “Many people are very, very concerned with the children in India, with the children in Africa where quite a number die, maybe of malnutrition, of hunger and so on, but millions are dying deliberately by the will of the mother. And this is what is the greatest destroyer of peace today.”
Mother Teresa was revered in Catholic countries around the world, particularly in Ireland. A statement made by a Catholic bishop made during Mother Teresa’s visit to Knock in 1993, gives an idea of the level of adulation felt for her. Addressing the crowd which had come out to see Mother Teresa, the Irish bishop said that “no woman has made such an impact here since ‘Our Lady’ herself appeared in 1879,” – a reference to a supposed apparition of Mary appearing at Knock Shrine in the late 19th century.
Later, Mother Teresa said to the adoring crowd, “let us promise Our Lady, who loves Ireland so much, that we will never allow in this country a single abortion,” before quickly adding, “and no contraceptives.”