Mother Teresa Never Said she was FYROMian!

“By blood, I am Albanian. By citizenship, an Indian. By faith, I am a Catholic nun. As to my calling, I belong to the world. As to my heart, I belong entirely to the Heart of Jesus.”

Mother Teresa, born Agnesë Gonxhe Bojaxhiu, never considered herself as “Macedonian” as Skopje and its Diaspora would like to promote. She has been highlighted as one of the most important and beloved “Macedonians” from the FYROM. Some of Skopje’s Diaspora organizations asking for donations to support their causes even classify their higher donators/supporters on a “Mother Teresa level”.

Recently, a spotlight on Skopje by CNN’s iList Series contains a video about Mother Teresa. Again, clear implications are made that she was…”Macedonian”.

This is the video link to the CNN video: http://cnn.com/video/?/video/world/2010/05/17/ilist.robertson.mother.teresa.cnn

However, let’s see how exactly Mother Teresa saw herself:

1) From the official Vatican website comes her official quote: “By blood, I am Albanian. By citizenship, an Indian. By faith, I am a Catholic nun. As to my calling, I belong to the world. As to my heart, I belong entirely to the Heart of Jesus. ” (Website of the Holy See of Vatican’s page on Mother Teresa:

http://www.vatican.va/news_services/liturgy/saints/ns_lit_doc_20031019_madre-teresa_en.html)

2) Mother Teresa had been asked another time (while she visited Skopje in 1980) what she felt she was and said: “I am a citizen of Skopje, my city of birth, but now belong to the world.”

This is verified from various sources including a commentary from US Foreign serviceman Gerald Zarr in GoNomad, a travel website. Furthermore, he wrote: “Albanians reasonably ask why the plaque is in English and [FYROMian], but not Albanian. Still, Mother Teresa always downplayed ethnic issues.” (link to the GoNomad article:

http://www.gonomad.com/destinations/0507/macedonia.html)

The final verification we would like to highlight is from a Skopje based website. At least they admitted that she didn’t call herself “Macedonian”…ever.

In conclusion, she was an Albanian born in the Ottoman Empire in Skopje but more importantly, she never considered herself to be anything…”Macedonian” regardless what Skopje’s nationalists want to think in their attempt to rewrite history and create their nation and ethnicity. Mother Teresa can now be added to a growing list of created FYROMian national heroes such as Philip II (Greek), Alexander the Great (Greek), Cleopatra (Greek), Tsar Samuel (Bulgarian), Saints Cyril and Methodius (Greek), Krste Misirkov (Bulgarian), Goce Delcev (Bulgarian), and Dame Gruev (Bulgarian) among others.