Quotes from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“The rich world likes and wishes to believe that someone, somewhere, is doing something for the Third World. For this reason, it does not inquire too closely into the motives or practices of anyone who fulfills, however vicariously, this mandate.”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“It is often said, inside the Church and out of it, that there is something grotesque about lectures on the sexual life when delivered by those who have shunned it. Given the way that the Church forbids women to preach, this point is usually made about men. But given how much this Church allows the fanatical Mother Teresa to preach, it might be added that the call to go forth and multiply, and to take no thought for the morrow, sounds grotesque when uttered by an elderly virgin whose chief claim to reverence is that she ministers to the inevitable losers in this very lottery.”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“Ethiopians imagine their gods as black and snub-nosed; Thracians blue-eyed and red-haired. But if horses or lions had hands, or could draw and fashion works as men do, horses would draw the gods shaped like horses and lions like lions, making the gods resemble themselves. Xenophanes”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“I began the project of judging Mother Teresa’s reputation by her actions and words rather than her actions and words by her reputation.”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“There should be philosophy and knowledge for the elect, religion and sentimentality for the masses”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“Where questions of religion are concerned, people are guilty of every possible sort of dishonesty and intellectual misdemeanor.”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“Who would be so base as to pick on a wizened, shriveled old lady, well stricken in years, who has consecrated her entire life to the needy and the destitute? On the other hand, who would be so incurious as to leave unexamined the influence and motives of a woman who once boasted of operating more than five hundred convents in upward of 105 countries—“without counting India”? Lone self-sacrificing zealot, or chair of a missionary multinational? The scale alters with the perspective, and the perspective alters with the scale.”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“Where questions of religion are concerned, people are guilty of every possible sort of dishonesty and intellectual misdemeanor. Sigmund Freud, The Future of an Illusion”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“Government regulations required that an elevator be installed for the use of the disabled. Mother would not allow an elevator. The city offered to pay for the elevator. Its offer was refused. After all the negotiations and plans, the project for the poor was abandoned because an elevator for the handicapped was unacceptable.”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“Three years later, Mr. Turley has received no reply to his letter. Nor can anybody account for the missing money: saints, it seems, are immune to audit.”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“The point is not the honest relief of suffering but the promulgation of a cult based on death and suffering and subjection. Mother”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“The point is not the honest relief of suffering but the promulgation of a cult based on death and suffering and subjection.”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

“This is a small episode in an unending argument between those who know they are right and therefore claim the mandate of heaven, and those who suspect that the human race has nothing but the poor candle of reason by which to light its way.”
― Christopher Hitchens, quote from The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

About the author

Popular quotes

“At the stomp of boots on grass, I ease my eyes open. Aithinne leans down with a grin. “You didn’t die. See? I told you it was easy.” She offers me a hand and I take it, rising unsteadily to my feet.

“I’ve been bitten by some demonic woodland creature. My legs have been shredded by razor-sharp trees. We almost died. Easy? I’m getting you a damn dictionary.”

I inspect my bleeding arm. The cut bisects five of the marks Lonnrach made, and I feel inexplicably proud of that. Good. Replace the old, bad memories with new badges. Start over.

“A dictionary,” she repeats. “Is that a type of dessert?”

For the love of—“It’s a type of book that explains the meaning of words.”

“Oh. That sounds terribly dull. I was really hoping for dessert.”

I’m hoping to end this rescue with my sanity intact.”
― Elizabeth May, quote from The Vanishing Throne

“Dia tidak pernah takut pada laba-laba, sepeda yang kotor, atau jemarinya terkena panas oven--dan dia sering mengalami semua itu. Namun, berjalan ke ruangan yang sama dengan pria yang ditaksirnya? Itu menakutkan.”
― quote from Bliss

“For one human being to love another human being: that is perhaps the most difficult task that has been given to us, the ultimate, the final problem and proof, the work for which all other work is merely preparation.”
― Rainer Maria Rilke, quote from The Selected Poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke

“Shandy looked ahead. Blackbeard, apparently willing to get the explanation later, had picked up his oars and was rowing again.
'May I presume to suggest,' yelled Shandy giddily to Davies,
'that we preoceed the hell out of here with all due haste.'
Davies pushed a stray lock of hair back from his forehead and sat down on the rower's thwart. 'My dear fellow consider it done.”
― Tim Powers, quote from On Stranger Tides

“Things happen, I thought, and we respond. That's what it all comes down to. To believe anything else, as far as I could tell, was simply an illusion.”
― Alice Steinbach, quote from Without Reservations: The Travels of an Independent Woman

Interesting books

About BookQuoters

BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.