On January 10, 1984, the Reagan administration established full diplomatic relations with the Vatican, ending more than a century of official separation, but often secret contacts, between the White House and Vatican.

History has recorded that the friendship between the Pope and the president that Richard Allen called “one of the great secret alliances of all time,” sealed with a handshake in the Vatican, resulted in the liberation of Poland, the fall of the Iron Curtain, the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the demise of Communism in Europe, and the end of the Cold War.

CHAPTER 8

Opus Dei: The Pope’s Cult

The vast majority of Americans, and many, if not most, Roman Catholics in the United States never heard of Opus Dei before the publication of Dan Brown’s novel The Da Vinci Code or until the film version opened in theaters from coast to coast. The sensational book and movie introduced Opus Dei in the form of an albino priest committing a murder in the Louvre Museum in Paris.

At the zenith of The Da Vinci Code phenomenon, Time magazine noted that the book depicted Opus Dei as “a powerful and ultraconservative Roman Catholic faction riddled with sadomasochistic ritual… In its 78 years, Opus Dei was a rumor magnet. Successful and secretive, it was accused of using lavish riches” and influence in the Vatican “to do everything from propping up Francisco Franco’s Spanish dictatorship to pushing through” rapid beatification for its founder in 1992, only seventeen years after his death.

Declared by Pope John Paul II to be a “personal prelature” in 1982, Opus Dei, meaning “God’s work,” has been called a “global quasi-diocese, able in some cases to leapfrog local archbishops and deal directly with [the Pope in] Rome.

Opus Dei states that it is a Catholic institution with a mission to spread “the message that work and the circumstances of everyday life are occasions for growing closer to God, for serving others, and for improving society.”

Critics say it’s a dangerous, if not malevolent, religious cult.

Wherein lies the truth?

On October 2, 1928, in Spain, twenty-six-year-old Josemaría Escrivá envisioned “a movement of pious laypeople who would, by prayerful contemplation and steady dedication of their labor to Christ, extend the holiness of going to church on Sunday into their everyday work life… He saw Opus eventually acting as ‘an intravenous injection [of holiness] in the bloodstream of society.’”

In the wake of the publication of The Da Vinci Code, and the description of Opus Dei in the novel as a sinister and malevolent group, Time reported, “Opus Dei is not a kind of spiritual pick-me-up for casual Catholics. It features a small, committed membership (85,500 worldwide and a mere 3,000 in the U.S.), many of whom come from pious families and are prepared to embrace unpopular church teachings such as its birth-control ban. Members take part in a rigorous course of spiritual ‘formation’ stressing church doctrine and contemplation plus Escrivá’s philosophy of work and personal holiness.” Opus Dei says that it helps everyday people to “seek holiness in their work and ordinary activities.”

According to the Opus Dei website, any lay Catholic may ask to join Opus Dei as long as he or she is at least eighteen years old. It takes about five years to join, with a person’s commitment to joining having to be renewed each year, before a lifelong commitment is possible. Opus Dei has been described as “a strong advocate of traditional Catholic values, focusing on the spreading of the Catholic teaching that every individual is called to become a saint and an apostle of Jesus Christ and that ordinary life is a path to sanctity…

“There are three types of members of Opus Dei: numeraries, associates and supernumeraries. Associates and numeraries make up about 25 percent to 30 percent of [the] members. They are celibate, live with other members and, on occasion, practice corporal mortification.” This is the practice of physically enduring a minor amount of suffering. “Some of the celibate members of Opus Dei practice traditional Catholic penances such as using the cilice (a light metal chain with prongs which is worn round the thigh) and the discipline (a woven cotton strap). The motivation for these voluntary penances is to imitate Christ and to join in His redemptive sacrifice, and to suffer in solidarity with poor and deprived people all over the world.” The majority of Opus Dei members are supernumeraries. They account for around three quarters of the members. They are usually noncelibate, married men or women.

In 1982, Pope John Paul II made Opus Dei the only “personal prelature” in the Catholic Church. This meant that Opus Dei’s members were responsible only to Rome and God, not to local bishops. Opus Dei says “that this unique position does not in any way mean that its members are in specifically high regard by the Vatican, or given any special treatment. Personal prelature is a canonical term meaning that the jurisdiction of the Catholic Church over Opus Dei covers the members of Opus Dei, rather than a geographical area like a diocese. A personal prelature operates in a similar way to a religious order, however there are no geographical limits, and members are laypeople rather than monks or nuns.

“Those Catholics who belong to Opus Dei also continue to be part of the congregation at their local church. Unlike members of religious orders, the members of Opus Dei join by means of private contracts and not vows. In order to join members must ask to do so, and they must also be convinced that they have received a vocation… Members have to donate a significant part of their income to Opus Dei. It is a decentralized organization and does not publish its general accounts.” Critics have also described it as a sort of Catholic Freemasonry, accusing it of being secretive and manipulative. It has a special set of greetings: “Pax” and “In aeternum” (“Peace” and “In eternity”). Its 1950 constitution barred members from revealing their membership without getting permission from the director of their center. In 1982, a new document repudiated “secrecy or clandestine activity.” Yet Opus did not identify its members, and many preferred not to identify themselves.

The American branch of Opus Dei noted that it began its apostolic activities “in Chicago in 1949, when Sal Ferigle, a young physics graduate student, and Fr. Joseph Muzquiz, one of the first three priests to be ordained for Opus Dei, arrived in Chicago. The first center was established near the University of Chicago. Today there are more than 3,000 members in the United States, and a great many more who participate in Opus Dei’s activities of spiritual formation. These activities are organized from 60 centers in 19 cities: Boston; Chicago; Dallas; Delray Beach, Florida; Miami; Milwaukee; New York; Pittsburgh; Princeton, New Jersey; Providence; St. Louis; San Antonio; Houston; Los Angeles; San Francisco; South Bend, Indiana; South Orange, New Jersey; Urbana, Illinois; and Washington, DC.”

The Prelature of Opus Dei uses seven conference centers for retreats and seminars. They are located near Boston, Chicago, Houston, Miami, New York, San Francisco and Washington, DC.

Opus Dei members, in cooperation with others, operate one college and five secondary schools in the United States. They are Lexington College in Chicago, The Heights and Oakcrest near Washington, DC; Northridge Prep and The Willows near Chicago; and the Montrose School near Boston. Opus Dei also has residences for university students, the largest of which is Bayridge Residence for women in Boston. Other residences for university women are Petawa Residence in Milwaukee and Westfield Residence in Los Angeles. Residences for university men include Elmbrook Student Center in Boston; Lincoln Green in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois; Windmoor in South Bend; and Wingren in Dallas.