An Italian song that St Josemaria loved

Aprite le finestre - 'Open the Windows', an Italian song that St Josemaria wanted people to sing to him as he was dying. The following is the account of this episode as given by Pilar Urbano in her biography of St Josemaria, 'El Hombre de Villa Tevere'. Tags: Joy, Death, Get-together

Carmen Escrivá

Msgr. Alvaro del Portillo

Bishop Alvaro del Portillo, who knew St Josemaria’s mother and sister very well, spoke in the book Immersed in God about what both of them meant for the founding and development of Opus Dei. “The availability of our Founder’s mother and sister proved of incalculable value to Opus Dei.” Tags: Alvaro del Portillo, The Escriva family, Opus Dei, Administration, Carmen Escrivá

October 16, 1931, in a Madrid streetcar: Abba, Pater!

John F. Coverdale

I learned to call God “Father” as a child in the Our Father. But to feel, to see, to admire God’s desire that we be his children…, that was on the street, in a streetcar, for an hour or an hour and a half, I’m [...] Tags: Divine sonship, History, Madrid

Prehistory of the founding of Opus Dei (1917-1928)

Opus Dei was founded by Josemaría Escrivá de Balaguer on October 2, 1928. At that point he was a 26-year-old priest. Up till that moment, there is no history of Opus Dei as such. There was a prehistory, which was the story of its Founder’s life and which had different stages. Tags: October 2, 1928, Founding of Opus Dei, History, Footprints in the Snow, Vocation

Opus Dei founder’s devotion to the Holy Cross

Salvador Bernal

The founder of Opus Dei always had great devotion to the crucifix, and he expressed this, among other places in n. 302 of his book The Way. Tags: Cross, Jesus Christ

How the founder of Opus Dei practised the spirit of mortification

Javier Echevarria

He practised in his own life what he always taught: “When you really love, no sacrifice is hard; love hopes for everything and gives everything. The only explanation for Christ’s Passion is love. Mortification is the prayer of the body and the soul. Put love into it, and everything you do will seem little.” Tags: Love of God, Contrition, Little things, Cross, Mortification

Anniversary of the death of Msgr. Alvaro del Portillo, St Josemaría’s first successor

Early in the morning of March 23, 1994, God called his good and faithful servant to Himself. Bishop del Portillo had returned only a few hours before from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, where, with deep prayer and piety, he had followed Jesus’ footsteps from Nazareth to the Holy Sepulcher, and had celebrated his last Mass on earth in the Church of the Cenacle in Jerusalem. Tags: Alvaro del Portillo, Death, Opus Dei prelate

How the Founder of Opus Dei experienced the Sacrament of Reconciliation

Bishop Javier Echevarría

In the book-length interview in which Bishop Javier Echevarría relates his memories of Saint Josemaría, founder of Opus Dei, Salvador Bernal says: “Meditating on the Cross also gave rise, in Msgr. Escrivá’s soul, to contrition and a spirit of atonement, culminating in his reception of the Sacrament of Reconciliation.” Bishop Echevarría’s response was as follows. Tags: Sacrament of Reconciliation, Contrition, Humility, Javier Echevarria

Our Lady of Guadalupe

Ana Sastre

St Josemaria's first trip to Latin America in May 1970. Tags: Poverty, Priesthood, Get-together, Catechetical trips, Our Lady

The Sanctity of Human Love

Salvador Bernal

The Founder of Opus Dei taught people all over the world to love the family. At a time when sanctity seemed to have become more or less the preserve of the religious and priests, God made use of him to make many married couples see that married life is a true path to sanctity on earth. Tags: Marriage, Vocation