Recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, feted by politicians, the Church and the world's media, Mother Teresa of Calcutta appears to be on the fast track to sainthood. But what, asks Christopher Hitchens, makes Mother Teresa so divine? In a frank expose of the Teresa cult, Hitchens details the nature and limits of one woman’s mission to the world's poor. He probes the source of the heroic status bestowed upon an Albanian nun whose only declared wish is to serve God. He asks whether Mother Teresa’s good works answer any higher purpose than the need of the world's privileged to see someone, somewhere, doing something for the Third World. He unmasks pseudo-miracles, questions Mother Teresa’s fitness to adjudicate on matters of sex and reproduction, and reports on a version of saintly ubiquity which affords genial relations with dictators, corrupt tycoons and convicted frauds.

Christopher Hitchens lives in Washington, D.C. and writes for Slate and the Daily Mirror and is contributing editor to The Atlantic Monthly and Vanity Fair.

Reviews

“Is nothing sacred? Well, no ... a witty, informative study in applied iconoclasm.” — In These Times

“Anyone with ambivalent feelings about the influence of Catholic dogma (especially concerning sex and procreation); about the media's manufacture of images; or about what one can, should or shouldn't do for someone less fortunate, should read this book.” — San Francisco Bay Guardian

“Hitchens argues his case with consummate style.“— New York Times

“A dirty job but someone had to do it. By the end of this elegantly written, brilliantly argued piece of polemic, it is not looking good for Mother Teresa.“ — Sunday Times (London)

 Publication
April 1997s

100 pages

Paper
ISBN-13: 978-1-85984-054 2
US$16.95




Other Verso books by
Christopher Hitchens:

Unacknowledged Legislation: Writers in the Public Sphere

Hostage to History: Cyprus from the Ottomans to Kissinger

The Elgin Marbles: Should They Be Returned to Greece?

No One Left to Lie To:
The Values of the Worst
Family

For the Sake of Argument: Essays and Minority Reports