NOBLE JOURNEY; LOWLY, POWERFUL ATTEND FUNERAL.

Byline: Ranjan Roy Associated Press 

India and the world bade farewell to Mother Teresa today, honoring with the pomp of a state funeral the nun who dedicated her life to caring for the weak and impoverished.

The poor and the sick gathered with presidents and royalty to honor Mother Teresa, whose funeral carriage was decorated with garlands of jasmine for its procession through Calcutta's streets.

A military honor guard bore her open casket into the funeral at Netaji Indoor Stadium, and placed it on a platform tilted to afford mourners a view of her body.

``Works of love are works of peace,'' read a banner across the altar.

A Christian in an overwhelmingly Hindu nation, Mother Teresa combined a simple life and an unremitting focus on the world's poorest to build a worldwide network of charities.

Her work freely crossed religious boundaries, caught the attention and admiration of world leaders and won her the 1979 Nobel Peace Prize.

Earlier, soldiers in blue caps draped an Indian flag across her open white casket, carried it from the church where it had lain in state since Sunday and placed it on a gun carriage.

From the church, a green military troop truck carrying soldiers and nuns seated face to face towed the carriage along the procession route while mourners tossed flower petals from balconies.

Military police in red-plumed turbans lined the streets along the three-mile route to the stadium.

Thousands gathered along the funeral route to get their final glimpse of the nun, and small groups slipped past police cordons to run beside the cortege.

Mother Teresa, known here as the saint of the gutters and considered by many of the poor to be an angel, died Sept. 5 at the age of 87.

With the sun peeking from behind the clouds, one mourner said Mother Teresa inspired him to organize a group to help the poor in his town, Asansol, 130 miles east of Calcutta.

``I have learned a lot from her ways,'' said Sumit Ganguly, a businessman. ``It is unique in the world, the way she preached love.''

A cross of white flowers hung from the truck pulling the carriage, which had been used in the funerals of independence leader Mohandas Gandhi in 1948 and India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, in 1964.

Thousands had lined up until the last minute Friday, in rain and 95-degree temperatures, for a chance to see and touch her glass coffin. Police turned away hundreds who came too late, but many of Calcutta's unfortunate and sick were given passes to attend the funeral.

India's Foreign Ministry said 23 countries were to be represented at the ceremonies. First lady Hillary Rodham Clinton led the U.S. delegation, with Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the Vatican's secretary of state, sent to celebrate the funeral Mass as Pope John Paul's personal representative.

Final funeral preparations began Friday night behind the huge wooden doors of St. Thomas' Church, where Calcutta's poorest had been able to view the body.

The route of the funeral procession was lengthened at the last minute to allow more of Calcutta's 12 million people - a third of them slum-dwellers - to watch her body pass by. The burial at the headquarters of her Missionaries of Charity order was to be private.

At the stadium Friday, a chorus of nuns had practiced hymns and work crews erected wooden crosses ahead of today's funeral.

Sitting outside the room converted into Mother Teresa's final resting place, her successor as head of the order, Sister Nirmala, said Friday that she had no worries about the order's future.

``The Missionaries of Charity is dependent on divine providence. God will provide whatever we need,'' she said.

In her first news conference, she met criticism Mother Teresa herself often faced - that the order failed to address the overwhelming underdevelopment that causes poverty. She said the nuns, monks and volunteers inspired by Mother Teresa would continue to work as they always had.

``We are going to serve the poor. Why they are poor is not our concern,'' she said.

She said the order hoped to fulfill Mother Teresa's last dream, to work in mainland China, one day soon.

Sister Nirmala hesitated only once, when a reporter shouted a question about condoms. ``It is against the law of God,'' she said softly after a moment.

She also said abortion was never justified, even in cases of rape. Both positions are Catholic doctrine, and were often expressed by Mother Teresa.

Mother Teresa's private burial was designed as a simple affair, lasting ``just a few minutes,'' she said, with the body lowered into its grave after a prayer.

``This is the place she loved to be. This is her home,'' Sister Nirmala said.

Slabs of white marble and a rectangular concrete box about 3 feet high could be seen in the former dining room that will hold Mother Teresa's remains. The room's walls were painted beige, and its cement floors covered in brown linoleum.

Mother Teresa's funeral comes only a week after thousands gathered in London for the funeral of Princess Diana. The princess was buried reportedly with a rosary given to her by Mother Teresa.

Mother Teresa was born in what is now Macedonia, but became an Indian citizen in the 1940s. In 1946, when she was a young nun teaching in church schools in Calcutta, she said she received a call from God to serve the ``poorest of the poor.''

She went on to found hundreds of orphanages, soup kitchens, homeless shelters and clinics run by her 4,000-member Missionaries of Charity order.

DIGNITARIES IN ATTENDANCE

Some of the dignitaries attending Mother Teresa's funeral in Calcutta:

First lady Hillary Clinton.

Aline Chretien, wife of Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien.

Italian President Oscaro Luigi Scalfaro.

Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

Jordan's Queen Noor.

Former Philippine President Corazon Aquino.

British Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott.

Belgium's Queen Fabiola.

New Zealand Minister of Health Bill Heath.

Spanish Queen Sofia.

CAPTION(S):

2 Photos, 2 Boxes

Photo: (1--Color) Indian military officers carry Mother Teresa's coffin from Saint Thomas' Church in Calcutta to a waiting gun carriage.

(2) A man offers water to people lined up outside Saint Thomas' Church waiting to view Mother Teresa's body before her funeral.

Associated Press

Box: (1--Color) FIRST COVERAGE - FULL COVERAGE

(2) DIGNITARIES IN ATTENDANCE (See Text)