Most significant positive evidence
The strongest evidence concerns lifelong personal service, creation of institutions for abandoned people and mobilisation of global attention and donations toward severe poverty.
Person
Mother Teresa
The assessment covers the Missionaries of Charity, direct service to destitute and dying people, global fundraising, standards of medical and palliative care and opposition to contraception and abortion.
This is a contemporary assessment current to 26 June 2026. It must be revised as later conduct and evidence become available.
Ethical assessment categories
Current published result
Overall ethical score
+37.32
Reasoned summary
Mother Teresa's record combines genuine personal sacrifice and large charitable reach with serious shortcomings in evidence-based care, accountability and respect for reproductive autonomy.
This assessment presents six separate ethical dimensions rather than one overall moral score. Each result must be read with its evidence, plausible range, confidence, disputes, exclusions, severe-harm findings and sources.
Most significant negative evidence
The score is substantially reduced by inadequate clinical standards reported in some homes, limited transparency and categorical opposition to reproductive choice and contraception.
Read the full Mother Teresa ethical assessment, evidence and sources
Six-dimensional ethical profile
The overall figure is the equal-weight average of the applicable dimensions. It does not replace the separate scores, evidence or uncertainty.
- Personal moral conduct
- +70.00
- Rights and dignity
- -27.64
- Nonviolence and harm
- +40.00
- Stewardship of power
- +65.00
- Wisdom and truthfulness
- +30.00
- Consequential legacy
- +46.55
- Severe-harm record
- No separate finding recorded
Assessment history
Ethical assessment: Mother Teresa (1950–1997)
1950–1997 · Published assessment · reviewed June 26, 2026
Result: Six-dimensional ethical profile