TO LOVE AND BE LOVED

One man’s memories of the iconic saint.

Towey is a former president of Saint Vincent College and Ave Maria University, and he served as director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives under George W. Bush. However, he begins this combination of memoir and biography during his days as a Senate staffer, a role that gave him the opportunity to meet Mother Teresa (1910-1997). For the next 12 years, the author developed a close friendship with her, and that relationship fundamentally changed the direction of his life. He also acted as her lawyer and as legal counsel for the order she had established, the Missionaries of Charity. This position provided Towey with a rare level of access to Mother Teresa and unique insight into her interactions with the world around her, whether in her home in Calcutta or in the halls of power around the world. Towey’s primary narrative focus is the profound impact Mother Teresa and the Missionaries of Charity made on him throughout his life. In a short amount of time, after having witnessed and taken part in the work of the nuns, the author began to feel his goals and direction changing. “I could feel the sisters setting a new trajectory for my life, and I liked where I was heading,” he writes. “They were making me a better man.” Though Towey’s personal, transformative relationship with Mother Teresa forms the central theme, he also offers a fascinating inside look into Mother Teresa’s daily life. He paints a picture of an aging woman who has survived tremendous ordeals, ranging from hunger and disease to revolution and warfare. Despite this, the Mother Teresa he knew was unfailingly kind, loving, and—in a theme he returns to throughout the text—maternal.

Critics may read Towey’s work as a hagiography, but it is nonetheless inspiring and joyful.