prohibited new orders to open houses outside of the diocese. Initially,
Mother Teresa realized that between the archbishop’s emphatic enforce-
ment of this rule, and the horrific problems she faced in Calcutta, expan-
sion of any kind was clearly out of the question.
But, in 1959, things had changed. There was one year left before the
probationary period of the Missionaries of Charity formally ended, and
the sisters were eager to take their mission outside of Calcutta and begin
work in other parts of India. When Mother Teresa went to Archbishop
Périer, he relented. But he told Mother Teresa that her work could only
expand into other areas of the country, not beyond. She agreed. New
houses of the Missionaries of Charity were established—and warmly wel-
comed by church and city officials—in Delhi and Jhansi. The news of
their work reached the highest echelons of Indian government; at the
dedication of a children’s home in Delhi, the Prime Minister of India,
Jawaharlal Nehru, was in attendance. When introduced to him, Mother
Teresa proceeded to tell the prime minister of her order. Gently stopping
her, Nehru replied that he did not need to hear of her work; he knew all
about it and that was why he had come to the ceremony. The Missionar-
ies of Charity also sent a group of nuns to Ranchi, a city located in the ex-
tremely poor state of Bihar. Here, many girls from the local tribes were
recruited to become Missionaries of Charity with great success.
In Bombay, a city with numerous Catholic churches and schools, the
Missionaries of Charity were welcomed by none other than the head of
the Roman Catholic Church in Bombay, Cardinal Valerian Gracias.
After a short tour of the city, Mother Teresa angered many of the residents
with her comment that the slums of Bombay were worse than those in
Calcutta. But many others recognized that beside the many palatial
homes found in the city were also tall buildings with little ventilation, no
indoor plumbing, and very little fresh air. With Cardinal Gracias’s bless-
ing, Mother Teresa soon opened a home for the dying, similar to Nirmal
Hriday.
In the autumn of 1960, Mother Teresa looked beyond the borders of
her adopted country and accepted an invitation to speak at the National
Council for Catholic Women to be held in Las Vegas, Nevada. Although
it seemed an unlikely destination for a woman considered a saint through-
out India, Mother Teresa went with the hope of raising more funds for the
Missionaries of Charity.
By this time, Mother Teresa was 50 years old and in charge of 119 nuns,
all but three of whom were Indian, and she wished to carry her message
further. As it turned out, her reputation was already becoming established
on the world stage. In the United States, she had appeared on the front
92 MOTHER TERESA