Early Life and Call to Religious Life
Mother Teresa’s early years were marked by a deep sense of religious commitment. Born to Albanian parents, Nikollë and Drana, Anjezë was the youngest of three children. Her father, a merchant, died when she was just eight years old, leaving the family in difficult circumstances. From a young age, Anjezë was drawn to the church, and by the age of 12, she felt a calling to religious life. She became increasingly determined to devote her life to God and to serving others.
At 18, she left her home in Skopje and joined the Sisters of Loreto, an Irish Catholic order of nuns, in Dublin, Ireland. In 1929, she took the name Teresa, after Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, the patron saint of missionaries. She then traveled to India to serve as a teacher at the Loreto convent in Calcutta (now Kolkata), where she would spend much of her life. shutdown123