St. Teresa of Calcutta added to Church calendar as optional memorial

Mother Teresa (left) smiles during Mass at Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Atlanta on June 12, 1996. / Credit: Doug Collier/AFP via Getty Images

Vatican City, Feb 11, 2025 / 09:05 am (CNA).

Pope Francis on Tuesday added the Sept. 5 feast of St. Teresa of Calcutta to the Catholic Church’s liturgical calendar as an optional memorial.

The decree issued Feb. 11 by the Vatican noted the influence of St. Teresa’s spirituality around the world and said her name “continues to shine out as a source of hope for many men and women who seek consolation amid tribulations of body and spirit.”

The General Roman Calendar is the liturgical calendar of the Catholic Church, which denotes the dates of holy days and the feast days of saints commemorated annually.

The Sept. 5 memorial of St. Teresa of Calcutta will now appear in the Church’s calendars and liturgical texts with specific prayers and readings to be used at Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours.

Memorials rank third in the classification of feast days on the Catholic Church’s liturgical calendar. The memorial of St. Teresa of Calcutta will be an optional memorial, which means it is voluntary whether to observe it.

Popularly known as Mother Teresa, St. Teresa of Calcutta was an Albanian sister who founded the Missionaries of Charity. She died in 1997 at the age of 87 after spending most of her life serving the poor in Calcutta, India. She was canonized by Pope Francis in 2016.

The decree, signed by Cardinal Arthur Roche, prefect of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, said: “Radically living the Gospel and boldly proclaiming it, St. Teresa of Calcutta is a witness to the dignity and honor of humble service. By choosing not only to be the least, but the servant of the least, she became a model of mercy and an authentic icon of the Good Samaritan.”

“Jesus’ cry on the cross, ‘I thirst’ (Jn 19:28), cut St. Teresa to the quick,” the decree continued. “Thus, for her whole life she dedicated herself completely to satiate the thirst of Jesus Christ for love and souls, serving him among the poorest of the poor. Filled with the love of God, she radiated that same love in equal measure to others.”

The decision to add the memorial of St. Teresa of Calcutta to the General Roman Calendar was approved by Pope Francis on Dec. 24, 2024. 

On Feb. 11, the liturgy dicastery published the decree and issued Latin texts for the new optional memorial to be translated by bishops’ conferences into the local languages and approved for publication by the dicastery. 

According to a note from Roche, the first reading chosen for Mass for the Sept. 5 memorial of Mother Teresa is taken from Isaiah 58 on the fast that is pleasing to God. The Psalm for the Mass will be Psalm 33: “I will bless the Lord at all times.”

The Gospel, he said, will be taken from St. Matthew, “which, after enumerating the works of mercy, contains the following words brought wonderfully to life in Mother Teresa: ‘Whatever you have done to the very least of my brothers and sisters you have done also to me’ (Mt 25:40).”