CTS Biographies - Ignatius Press

24M OTHER T ERESAThis longing by the still-young woman to give her all,to express in some way her desire to hold nothingwhatsoever back from God, was surely divinely inspiredand was part of what lay ahead. As we shall read, theGood Lord, it seems, would refer to it Himself whencalling Sister Teresa to leave the security of life in Loretoand ‘put out into the deep’.Day of the Great KillingIn 1946 another disaster struck Calcutta, this time a manmadeone. British rule was approaching its end. Tensionswere high amid the debates about a possible futureHindustan and Pakistan. Bengal threatened to declareindependence. The Muslim League declared Friday 16thAugust as a ‘Direct Action Day’. Three days before theevent, possibly in the hope of averting clashes betweenthe different communities, the Muslim leader of theCalcutta Corporation declared that the 16th would be apublic holiday so that people did not have to go to work.The Muslim League convened a mass rally inCalcutta’s great park, the Maidan. The day was hot, with atemperature of 31 degrees celsius - and a humidity rate of91 per cent. As the meeting broke up, Direct Action Dayerupted into horrendous inter-community violence inCalcutta. It turned into a frenzy of carnage and slaughterand destruction. On both sides, Muslim and Hindu, peoplewere burned alive, slashed to pieces, beaten to death.