When Mother Teresa visited Australia, some years ago, a Franciscan monk was assigned to be her guide and gofer. He was thrilled at the prospect and dreamed of how much he would learn from her. But he never got the opportunity to actually sit quietly and talk to her because there were always other people who wanted to meet her. So, when the tour was over and she was about to fly to New Guinea, he asked if he could pay his own fare and sit next to her on the plane so that he could just sit, listen and learn from her.
Mother Teresa looked at him and said: ‘You have enough money to pay the airfare to New Guinea?’ ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘Then give that money to the poor,’ she said. ‘You’ll learn more from that than anything I can tell you.’
It’s not just the hearing that makes faith grow, it’s the doing of it.