Priests Experience Canonization of St. Teresa in Rome, Kolkata

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Father Vincent Druding and Father Nicholas E. Callaghan were priests from the Archdiocese of New York who celebrated the canonization of St. Teresa of Calcutta up close on Sept. 4.

Father Druding stopped in Rome following his stay in India for the canonization and Father Callaghan was at the motherhouse of the Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata.

“It was an amazing and powerful experience,” Father Druding, parochial vicar at Assumption parish in Peekskill, told CNY.

Father Druding always hoped to one day visit Kolkata with his interest further inflated by parishioners at Assumption from the province of Goa, India, and his work with the Missionaries of Charity when he served for five months at St. Rita’s parish in the Bronx. St. Rita’s Convent, the first home for the St. Teresa-founded Missionaries of Charity in North America, serves as the North American Regional House for Eastern United States and Eastern Canada.

“They radiate the light and love of God,” Father Druding said of the Missionaries of Charity. “They radiate the presence of Jesus through their smiles and infectious joy and lives of prayer through Jesus. You can’t help but to catch the spirit of the love of Mother Teresa when you are around them and working alongside them.”

A year ago, the archbishop of Goa visited Assumption Church where a Mass and reception were held. During the gathering, Assumption’s pastor, Father John J. Higgins, light-heartedly said next year they were sending Father Druding to Goa.

“They took him seriously,” Father Druding said.

The Goan community in Peekskill raised money to fund Druding’s trip, which included stops at Goa, Mumbai and Kolkata. Father Druding celebrated Mass, heard confessions, visited the sick and visited the tomb of St. Teresa.

“It was a very moving experience and you feel a sense of peace when you enter,” Father Druding said. “People come streaming in all day long to pray. They put their head by the tomb and touch it to pray and leave their intentions. It’s a place of rest and prayer. It’s a holy ground.”

Father Druding visited Rome for the canonization of St. Teresa on Sept. 4 before returning to New York.

“We had great seats and view,” he said. “It was very moving when they declared her as a saint. They brought by her relics and passed by us. I felt a wave of the Holy Spirit and found myself crying tears of joy. She was being honored in heaven and on earth to honor her sacrifice of love.”

Father Callaghan has visited Kolkata several times to teach in the Missionaries of Charity continuing education program and his dates were set a year ago for Sept. 4-16.

“I usually come a day or two early anyway, so being here was a providential gift,” Father Callaghan told CNY in an email from India.

Father Callaghan, who just received a degree in canon law from Angelicum University in Rome and will begin studying for his doctorate shortly, said the singing afterward is what he’ll most remember of this year’s trip to Kolkata.

“Watching the Mass and ceremony with the sisters at the motherhouse was fun: given how fierce the Roman sun looked on the livefeed, it may have been just possible that we were more comfortable than the people out in St. Peter’s square,” he said.

“But the moment when they broke out into song when it was over was wonderful. The sisters take joy seriously. They vow wholehearted and cheerful service to the poor. Since they also vow poverty, they neither drink nor buy their cheer—to a great degree they sing it. They were on three floors looking down on the courtyard of the motherhouse. To hear that tall, narrow space fill with their joy was irreplaceable.”