New Delhi: Wednesday was the 10th death anniversary of Mother Teresa, eulogised across the world by many sobriquets like “the saint of the gutter” and “the messiah of love” for the poorest of the poor.

Yet she has some fierce critics, who call her a fanatic, a fundamentalist and even a fraud. Some call her God's divine light, while others say that she was anti-woman and anti-poor.

Adding to the furious debate on spirituality is a new book containing her letters, where she has written of her 60-year-long "crisis of faith."

"In my soul…" she writes, " I can't tell you how dark it is. How painful, how terrible, I feel like refusing god."

Was Mother Teresa more human than saint? On CNN-IBN show Face the Nation Rukmini Chawla Author of Life of Mother Teresa and Director, Intervention For Support Healing & Awareness Jasjit Purewal discussed the issue with Sagarika Ghose.

Was Mother Teresa more human than saint? Mother Teresa brought hope to the hopeless for years, year after year, and day after painful day. But there is criticism that there is no proper medical treatment or systematic diagnosis in Mother Teresa's homes and that suffering is seen as a gift of god.

Also Read: Mother Teresa Doubted God

It is said Mother Teresa was not a friend of the poor, but a friend of poverty. She loved the poor and the sick because they were the image of God and she kept them that way. She kept them poor and sick. “It’s for the first time that I’m hearing such an interpretation. I think the reality was very different.

She did see Jesus in every poor person that she saw or nursed,” said Rukmini Chawla Author, Life of Mother Teresa as she responded to the claims.

Mother Teresa did something that no one was doing at that time. She reached out to the poorest of the poor, healed the destitute, the lepers. But what was her attitude to the modern women?

Her critics say that Mother Teresa was opposed to birth control and abortion. She faced strong criticism for her views on divorce.

“I think what Teresa did was, she set a vertical limit. Within the ecclesiastical system and the church, I don’t think there has been anybody like her.

The Church was forced to look at this tiny woman who came from Albania to a foreign land, went and embraced the poorest of poor against all odds,” said Jasjit Purewal, Director, Intervention For Support Healing & Awareness.