Pope Francis is due to start the ceremony to canonize Mother Teresa as a saint on Sunday at 10.30 a.m. Vatican time, which is 2 p.m. India time and 4.30 a.m. Eastern Time. The Vatican Television Center said it would broadcast the holy mass and canonization live and a video stream from Saint Peter’s Square showed preparations for the event. Mother Teresa, an ethnic Albanian born in 1910 in what is today the Republic of Macedonia, joined an Irish order of nuns at the age of 18 and taught at the order’s schools in India. Pope John Paul II accelerated the canonization process in her case and declared her “blessed,” bestowing the highest honor short of sainthood in just six years, a short time. ENLARGE Mother Teresa received a bouquet of flowers from pupils on her 85th birthday at the Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata, India, Aug. 26, 1995.

Source: Wall Street Journal September 04, 2016 02:48 UTC