Go to Main Story

Go to Home Page

Mother Teresa Brings Call for Service, Peace, to D.C.

Mother Teresa, the Nobel Peace Prize winner who heads the worldwide Missionaries of Charity, attended her first U.S. high school graduation yesterday, handing out diplomas to graduates of Washington's Gonzaga High School and appealing for service and peace.

The 77-year-old nun, who lives in Calcutta, where she and her Roman Catholic order care for the poorest of the poor, shook hands with each of the Jesuit school's 186 graduates as she passed out diplomas. She stood one step up on the altar of St. Aloysius Church, but most of the graduates in the all-male class towered above her slight, stooped figure.

"She shook hands pretty firmly and said, 'Congratulations, God bless you,' " said graduate Brian Amorosi after the ceremony.

"It is almost absurd that a person like Mother Teresa should come halfway around the world to attend a ceremony honoring us," said valedictorian Scott C. Smedira. "It is equally absurd that, in a world with so many people, that we as individuals make a difference. But that, too, is a reality."

Mother Teresa, accompanied by five members of her order, arrived just before the start of the ceremony. She left quietly just before it ended an hour and a half later, and was driven from the church on North Capitol Street in a small white van.

The Rev. Bernard J. Dooley, president of the 167-year-old school, said he wrote Mother Teresa a letter of invitation about a year ago and also "had some help from some parents who know her."

Instead of making a donation to the school, the seniors gave their class gift -- about $4,000 -- to her order, which operates three missions in the District. She received no honor or award yesterday. Some universities -- Georgetown six years ago and Columbia last week -- have given her honorary degrees.

Her speech was a homily, urging the graduates to serve others and "never be afraid to do small things with love."

"Hunger is not only for bread, though there are many places where people are dying of hunger," Mother Teresa said. "But there is that terrible hunger for love.

"The fruit of love is service. The fruit of service is peace," she continued. "And peace begins with a smile."

During the ceremony Mother Teresa smiled often as she chatted with Dooley. She applauded the school's wind ensemble after it played a march that John Philip Sousa had conducted at a Gonzaga graduation in 1886.

And she joined in applause and warm laughter for Dr. Richard D. Mudd, a 1917 graduate of the school, who said he has made it to a healthy "87 and 3/4" by following a regimen of "two steaks a year, one glass of wine a day, a low-cholesterol diet, one egg a week, and violent exercise."

About 1,200 people filled the church, which adjoins the school buildings. About 400 others watched the ceremony on closed-circuit television in a basement chapel.

After losing enrollment as its neighborhood north of Union Station deteriorated in the 1960s and 1970s, Gonzaga has flourished in recent years. It now draws about equal numbers of students from the District, Maryland and Virginia. The school has added buildings and refurbished old ones.

"We are important to the extent that we extend ourselves to others," Smedira said in his speech, echoing a theme of Mother Teresa's.