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The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice Paperback – April 10, 2012

4.5 out of 5 stars 2,732

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"A religious fundamentalist, a political operative, a primitive sermonizer, and an accomplice of worldly secular powers. Her mission has always been of this kind. The irony is that she has never been able to induce anybody to believe her. It is past time that she was duly honored and taken at her word."

Among his many books, perhaps none have sparked more outrage than The Missionary Position, Christopher Hitchens's meticulous study of the life and deeds of Mother Teresa.

A Nobel Peace Prize recipient beatified by the Catholic Church in 2003, Mother Teresa of Calcutta was celebrated by heads of state and adored by millions for her work on behalf of the poor. In his measured critique, Hitchens asks only that Mother Teresa's reputation be judged by her actions-not the other way around.

With characteristic élan and rhetorical dexterity, Hitchens eviscerates the fawning cult of Teresa, recasting the Albanian missionary as a spurious, despotic, and megalomaniacal operative of the wealthy who long opposed measures to end poverty, and fraternized, for financial gain, with tyrants and white-collar criminals throughout the world.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Hilariously mean."―John Waters

"Convincing . . . Hitchens argues his case with consummate style."―
New York Times Book Review

"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

"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)

"If there is a hell, Hitchens is going there for this book."―
New York Press

About the Author

Christopher Hitchens was a contributing editor to Vanity Fair,Slate, and the Atlantic, and the author of numerous books, including works on Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, and George Orwell. He also wrote the international bestsellers god Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, Hitch-22: A Memoir, and Arguably. He died in December 2011.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Twelve; New edition (April 10, 2012)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 128 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1455523003
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1455523009
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 4.8 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.4 x 0.6 x 8.05 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 out of 5 stars 2,732

About the author

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Christopher Hitchens
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Christopher Hitchens (1949-2011) was the author of Letters to a Young Contrarian, and the bestseller No One Left to Lie To: The Values of the Worst Family. A regular contributor to Vanity Fair, The Atlantic Monthly and Slate, Hitchens also wrote for The Weekly Standard, The National Review, and The Independent, and appeared on The Daily Show, Charlie Rose, The Chris Matthew's Show, Real Time with Bill Maher, and C-Span's Washington Journal. He was named one of the world's "Top 100 Public Intellectuals" by Foreign Policy and Britain's Prospect.

Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5 out of 5
2,732 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Reviewed in the United States on March 26, 2024
Until reading this book I had never seen anything negative about Mother Theresa. My thanks to the author for this honest portrayal of her actions. I plan on reading more about her.

I also plan on reading more of Mr. Hitchens’ books.
Reviewed in the United States on March 10, 2005
"If there is a hell, Hitchens is going there for this book." So said the New York Press in respose to The Missionary Position, subtitled Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice. Written in 1995, during the height of Mother Teresa's popularity, this book was Hitchens' attempt to debunk the myth that was, and remains, Mother Teresa.

Written from the perspective of one who clearly is not a Christian, this book has been likened to a cruise missle. It is narrow in scope, yet devastatingly effective, for it strikes right to the heart of the matter. How are we to reconcile Mother Teresa, who cares for the sick and destitute, and Mother Teresa who holds hands and laughs with the wife of a brutal and notorious dictator? How are we to reconcile her desire to live out Christianity when she accepts million-dollar donations from the likes of Charles Keating?

The most significant chapter in this book is one which displays Mother Teresa's overwhelming hypocrisy. The author reproduces a letter that was sent from Mother Teresa to Judge Lance Ito, seeking clemency on his behalf. She suggests that while she knows nothing of his business dealings (in which he defrauded people of $250,000,000) what is more important is the service he has rendered to the poor. She asks that the judge to do what Jesus would do, which she evidently believes would be to let him free. Los Angeles deputy D.A., Paul Turley wrote a response to Mother Teresa, suggested that she should return the $1.25 million dollars given to her by Keating, promising he would return it to the rightful owner. He received no response.

Many others have written about Mother Teresa and have chastised her for this type of hypocrisy. Many have validated the claims that her care for the poor was more in providing a comfortable place for people to die than in seeking to heal them. Many have shown that she hoarded tens or hundreds of millions of dollars for no apparent purpose when these funds could have gone to build the finest hospitals and orphanages in India. And many Christian writers have shown that her faith bore only a passing resemblance to Christianity. But, as far as I know, this is the most significant (and only book-length treatment) of the subject, though at a mere 98 pages it reads more like an essay than a book.

As one who reads primarily books written by professed Christians, I was taken aback by Hitchens' prevailing attitude. "Given how much this Church allows the fanatic Mother Teresa to preach, it might be added that the call to go forth and multiply, and to take no thought for the morrow, sounds grotesque when uttered by an elderly virgin whose chief claim to reverence is that she ministers to the inevitable losers in this very lottery" (page 59). He is cynical, angry, hateful and sarcastic all at once. He despises the hypocrisy he sees in Mother Teresa and seems happy to extend his disillusionment to religion in general. He attacks not only Mother Teresa, but also Roman Catholic doctrine and practice, and even further, extends his attacks to Christianity and the Bible, especially Christian teaching on the sanctity of human life. And throughout, he uses only four footnotes, providing little evidence to support his claims. Despite all that, he argues effectively and some may even say, devastatingly.

In some ways this subject hardly seems to matter anymore, now that Mother Teresa has long since died. Yet her legacy lives on. Mother Teresa is still lauded as a hero by Catholics, Protestants and people of every other creed. It seems amply clear to those who are willing to look that her legacy is largely ficticious.
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Reviewed in the United States on January 4, 2024
Really informative and even enjoyable read. Hitchens was one of my favorite writers (still is) because he wrapped the English language around himself like a blanket, and his wit, intellect and ability to skewer an idea-good or bad-are among the best ever. I think Hitch was the Michelangelo of the written word. This book might be one of his minor works, but it is nevertheless a work of literary genius.
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Reviewed in the United States on March 3, 2024
Mother Teresa was quite a missionary, but she was not by any means a saintly person. She would rather let people perish than use good doctors to provide real care for the "guests" of her houses of squalor. She placed a much higher priority on fighting any form of birth control than she did assuring mothers were given professional care (beyond "prayer").

A British promoter became enamored of her story and worked hard to push her into sainthood. This book, written by the brilliant British-American author, essayist, and journalist Christopher Hitchens, exposes the truth with investigative journalism (interviews with those who worked with Mother Theresa) and first-hand experience with a key "miracle" glow that was easily explained by the groundbreaking new Kodak film used by the photographer who was with Mr. Hitchens at the time. The Catholic Church was more interested in adding a now-popular figure to their sainthood roster than it was in letting the truth be heard. (Does that sound familiar?)
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Reviewed in the United States on January 16, 2014
About 10 years ago, I hated Christopher Hitchens, particularly for his attacks on Mother Teresa. Of course, I was uncritically relying on Bill Donahue's Catholic League for my views on the subject. I was convinced that Hitchens was launching a malicious, hateful attack on a woman who did more good than he ever did. As you may have guessed, my views have changed since then. I no longer identify with the Catholic Church, or with any religion. That doesn't mean I am willing to accept any criticism of religion or religious figures, however. Indeed, I think that much of the anti-theist memes and rhetoric I see on social media are lazily thought out, tiresome, and gratuitoiusly insulting. Hitchens, however, definitely has assembled an incisive case against the idolization of Mother Teresa. The evidence is hard to argue against, and Hitchens only asks that her reputation by judged by her actions, not the other way around.

Hitchens case boils down to three elements:

*She was a friend of poverty, not the poor.
*She was well-connected to worldly leaders to further her ideological ends, despite her claims to be beyond politics
*She was given uncritical adulation by most of the press

On the first point, Hitchens gathers evidence from several former volunteers, as well as medical workers who visited the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta, and they all say the same thing: There was no one on staff who had medical training, or at least not adequate to treat the people who were coming. In fact, Mother Teresa consistently resisted any moves to have adequate medical care there, while she availed herself of the best hospitals in the Western world when she was battling her own medical ailments. Most damning of all, however, are her constant pronouncements that the poor suffering was beautiful.

On the second point, Hitchens presents evidence of Mother Teresa's close association with the Duvalier family in Haiti, Charles Keating, of the infamous Keating Five, and many others. Despite receiving large sums of money form such individuals, there has not been a proper audit of the Missionaries of Charity, and she certainly never used the money to improve her own facilities. Finally (and this is related to the first point as well), she constantly used her considerable reputation to denounce any form of abortion or contraception, despite the fact, as Hitchens points out, that women controlling their own fertility is one of the few known, proven ways to ameliorate poverty.

On the third point, Hitchens reiterates his thesis that her reputation should be judged by her actions, not her actions by her reputation. Much of the journalistic world, he declares, has failed to do this.

Hitchens wrote a searing indictment, one that cannot be simply dismissed. And despite the fact that Hitchens and Mother Teresa are both gone, the case he presented has yet to be convincingly answered by the ones who need to answer it- the Vatican and the Missionaries of Charity.
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Top reviews from other countries

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BriQ
5.0 out of 5 stars Late Great Hitchens!
Reviewed in Canada on February 23, 2020
All you wanted to know about this diabolical lady that duped millions into believing she's a saint! First hand accounts of the truth behind the white robe and smile.
2 people found this helpful
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Adriana
5.0 out of 5 stars livros em inglês
Reviewed in Brazil on March 7, 2019
excelente livro. Nos mostra um outro lado da Madre Teresa
Moumita Bagchi
5.0 out of 5 stars Must read this
Reviewed in India on April 20, 2019
It is good that we finally have a book which takes a long hard look at the uncritical appreciation being heaped on her. Mother Teresa is a creation of the media, perhaps to assuage some of the richer world’s guilt. Her position is no different from the missionaries who preceded or followed her, but with a more palatable package. It is we who are credulous enough to make her into something semi-divine.
8 people found this helpful
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Judy Tipple
5.0 out of 5 stars Well researched
Reviewed in Spain on December 7, 2018
You just got to love Chris Hitchens, a very informative and interesting read, well written and easy to read, what a pity he is no more
Víctor R
5.0 out of 5 stars Hitchens, cómo te extrañamos
Reviewed in Mexico on November 18, 2016
Compré este libro en cuanto me enteré que canonizarían a la señora Agnes (Madre Teresa) y lo disfruté mucho.
Está muy bien escrito (como todo lo que escribe Hitchens) y con palabras mordaces y pedazos de historias acaba con la teatralidad y la supuesta superioridad de este personaje,
Buen libro, por supuesto, no lo compres si crees que la Madre Teresa es una Santa y no estás dispuesto a escuchar lo contrario ni a reconsiderar tu opinión. Si no, definitivamente cómpralo, te vas a divertir mientras amplías tu conocimiento sobre Agnes.
2 people found this helpful
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