Thousands braved the rain and shared their memories of Mother Teresa during two events held in Kolkata to commemorate the revered nun’s death.

Mother Teresa “bestrode the century like a colossus,” said her biographer Nawin Chawla, during a Sept. 4 symposium held at the Assembly of God Church.

Chawla, who was former chief election commissioner of India, said he was privileged to be “in Mother Teresa’s shadow" and do whatever he could to aid her mission to the poor during the time she was alive.

Chawla was one of several speakers, including two Hindus, who spoke on the eve of the 13th anniversary of Mother Teresa’s death.

Some 800 people including about 300 Missionaries of Charity sisters, members of the congregation Mother Teresa founded, attended the symposium.

Barry O’Brien, a West Bengal Legislative Assembly member, described Mother Teresa as a person with a wonderful sense of humor, while Jesuit provincial Father George Pattery described her tireless efforts in crossing borders, searching for God in the poor and the suffering.

Some 3,000 people braved the rain the next day to attend a Mass in her honor at St. Xavier’s College.

Mother Teresa was a great teacher, said Archbishop Lucas Sirkar of Calcutta,  who led the Mass, together with Bishop Cyprian Monis of Asansol and Bishop Joseph Surin Gomes of Krishnagar.

Blessed Teresa was born Gonxha Bojaxhiu on Aug. 26, 1910, in what is now Macedonia. She came to Kolkata in 1929, at the age of 19, to become a Loreto nun. She later left that congregation and started her own Missionaries of Charity congregation to work for the “poorest of the poor” in Kolkata’s slums.

She died at the age of 87 and was buried in the city.

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