Mother Teresa was tiny in height but had a fierce determination and a will of steel in caring for the poor.

She was born in 1910 in Albania and named Mary Teresa Bojaxhiu. For her life’s work among the ill and poor, the Catholic Church revered her as Saint Teresa.

This tiny nun, as you may know, founded the Missionaries of Charity, a religious order with more than 4,500 nuns now active in 133 countries. Her nuns run homes for people dying of AIDS, leprosy and tuberculosis.

They provide soup kitchens, dispensaries, mobile clinics, children’s and family counselling, orphanages and schools.

They take vows of chastity, poverty, obedience and to give “wholehearted free service to the poorest of the poor.”

“The most terrible poverty,” Mother Teresa once said, “is loneliness and the feeling of being unloved.”

HER WORDS often come back to me after a frequent and recurring dream.

You may have dreams like this, too.

In the dreams, I am searching the streets of a strange city for my wife and children, fearing for their safety. Sometime the streets are empty. Not another living soul around.

I feel alone and frightened, not for myself but for those I love and cherish.

I awaken in a nervous sweat.

Should I seek professional help?

Probably not, I tell myself. They are only dreams. But what is my sleeping brain, my subconscious mind, trying to tell me?

AFTER MY FATHER died, I had dreams about him. Before meeting my wife, he had been my best friend, someone I knew I could always depend on.

The dream would be set in a hotel lobby.

A convention was going on and conventioneers crowded the lobby.

My father was on the far side of the lobby in his favorite hat and bow tie.

I would see him heading toward the revolving doors to the street. I would push through the crowd but out on the street he would be gone. I would look up and down the street but he had vanished,

It left me with an empty feeling.

MY FRIEND Bill Edmonds recalls a vivid memory of being lost and alone. As a 4-year-old child he became separated from his father in a large discount store.

What seemed like hours probably was less than 30 seconds, Bill said, but he remembered passing adults towering over him, casting dark shadows of despair as he stood there frozen in fear.

“I felt terrible. I cried. Being all alone is the worst thing any of us can imagine.

“I’ll never forget the wonderful sense of relief that came over me on seeing the face of my father as he rounded the corner and said, “Bill, I’m right here.” I ran into his arms and no longer felt alone.”

Do you have such dreams or recall such experiences of the terrible poverty of being alone and feeling unloved?

I would love to hear from you.

Email me at JerryBellune@yahoo.com

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