A Personal Perspective on Opus Dei's Critics

     The immense popularity of "The Da Vinci Code" has created a forum for both Opus Dei and its detractors to voice their views.  Some of the detractors are reported to be former members who relate painful personal experiences.  These experiences are depicted as the outcome of some very serious problems associated with Opus Dei itself or its founder, St. Josemaria Escriva.  Many people, inside and outside of Opus Dei are quick to refute these accusations with evident honesty and integrity.  But what often gets forgotten is that, while the accusations may be refutable, the experiences behind the accusations are often very real.  If the "error" of the detractor is in expanding personal experience into organizational evils, perhaps it is also true that many defenders who are unable to even imagine how these experiences can come about might lead one to unjustly question the integrity of the detractor.

     As I look back over the years since I met Opus Dei, I see how easily I could have fallen into the mindset of a detractor.  The vocation to Opus Dei is not lived out as a member of an organization, but as member of a spiritual family.  We all remain ourselves with our unique personalities and our less than perfect psychological makeup.  As we form our relationships personalities can collide and our respective limitations can test them, sometimes to the breaking point.  If we let it reach the breaking point, the pain can be tremendous.  This is not unique to the family of Opus Dei, as for example any married person can attest.

     I was introduced to Opus Dei within the first weeks of my undergraduate studies, bringing with me a somewhat solid but skewed view of the Catholic faith.  I came from a family of 10 children, with a rarely at home father who had all but abandoned his faith, and a mother whose world view was shaped by years in a convent run orphanage.  Thanks to my mother, I kept my faith which lead me to learn a fair amount  of Catholic moral theology.  I could convince you that abortion and birth control were wrong, but I wouldn't have lasted a minute in a discussion on Divine Filiation.  Unfortunately, mine was more a religion of "thou shalt not".  While I was almost immediately struck by the warm, family atmosphere of the Opus Dei center, my initial attraction was to a place where I could preserve my "orthodoxy".  Essentially, I had reduced it to something I was "supposed to do".

     I should also point out that I am an engineer.  As a friend of mine once said, and my extraordinarily tolerant wife can attest, "engineer" is both a profession and a diagnosis.  All my life I loved and needed lots of personal interaction, but I could spend endless hours creating engineering solutions in isolation: "proactively" maintaining relationships was not one of my strengths.  Also, while I possess an understanding of situations appropriate to a leader, I have been less than inclined to "push back" in relationships.  I could passively follow where others led as long as they stayed within the bounds of my moral theology.

     The meeting of this personality with Opus Dei was a challenge.  I had found the place for my true vocation, but my maturity had quite a bit further to go before I would be ready for it.  I liked coming to the center, but I started responding to any and all invitations by the young numeraries because I didn't push back.  In my mind I was "supposed to" go, even when I might have had a really good reason to be elsewhere.  Similarly, while I had thought my ultimate calling was to marriage, in my mind being a celibate numerary might also be something I was "supposed to do".  These inner attitudes were never clearly articulated by me, which led to quite a bit of vocational anxiety.  This went on until Father Sal Ferigle, a long time member of Opus Dei and my confessor at that time, helped me get to the bottom of it.  His simple advice concerning this invitation overload: "Just say no, PTT".

     This is just a small summary of what felt like a great deal of vocational pressure.  By and large, this pressure was self inflicted, aggravated by "a failure to communicate".  The young numeraries at the center certainly made no secret of their love for their vocation, but I can't recall anyone pressuring me.  In fact, the only time the topic of a numerary vocation came up was during a rather traumatic phase of my engagement (OK I'll say it, she gave the ring back!).  Already a supernumerary at that time, I talked with Fr. Sal about my feelings that maybe I should forget about her and just become a numerary.  His response was a polite and understanding phrasing of... "Have you lost your mind???".

     Everyone brings baggage to a relationship.  Perhaps many of the dissatisfied former members might have stories that started out similar to mine.  How easy it is to have a misunderstanding that is allowed to fester, or to adopt a pattern of reasoning in which concerns are not communicated but are instead added to a list of "well that's yet another thing wrong with this organization".  Finally, given the immeasurable benefit for me of what was virtually unlimited access to Fr. Sal, I wonder how many misunderstandings were due to a shortage of numeraries, especially ones with experience to be able to recognize the signs of some internal misgivings.

     Opus Dei is a great gift from God to the Church and mankind.  It is, however, entrusted to people with all of their marvelous gifts and inevitable shortcomings.  With or without Opus Dei, sanctity is the work of a lifetime.  In this life I owe an immeasurable debt of gratitude to God for the gift of Opus Dei.  With perseverance, I hope to be eternally grateful.