Opus Dei and The Da Vinci Code – Part II
Lee Penn
Spring 2006, Journal of the Spiritual Counterfeits Project (SCP)
© SCP, 2006-2008
By courtesy of the SCP, this article has been released for posting on the Internet. Readers
may order the magazine containing an illustrated version of this story by visiting the SCP
web site, at http://www.scp-inc.org, or by calling the SCP office in Berkeley, California,
at 510-540-0300, between 9am and 5pm Pacific Time. This magazine, Volume 29:4-30:1
(2006), also includes articles by Alan Morrison (“God TV”) and Brooks Alexander
(“Witchcraft: Real and Imagined – Part I”).
Part I
An illustrated copy of the first part of this story, published in the fall of 2005, is on-line
courtesy of the Journal of the Spiritual Counterfeits Project (SCP), at:
http://www.scp-inc.org/publications/journals/J2902/index.php
The article covers:
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The errors in the way that The Da Vinci Code portrayed Opus Dei
The history of Opus Dei and its founder, Josemaria Escrivá
The rising power of Opus Dei in the Catholic Church
The political influence of Opus Dei – including within the Republican establishment
in Washington
The cultic practices of Opus Dei: underhanded recruitment, control of members,
difficulties faced by those who leave the movement, secret documents, censorship,
and (for the inner circle) flagellation
The teachings of Escrivá – and their opposition to the Christian Gospel
Part II
This story continues where Part I left off. It covers:
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The pride, wrath, and love of luxury by Opus Dei’s founder, who was declared a saint
in 2002 by Pope John Paul II
The alignment of Opus Dei with fascism and the extreme right, from the Franco era
onward
The role of Opus Dei in the Catholic clergy abuse scandal and cover-up
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The case of Robert Hanssen, a devout Opus Dei member – and a Soviet spy who did
severe damage to the US
Opus Dei members’ role in financial scandals, arms deals, and political dirty tricks
The broader context: the rise of other cultic “new ecclesial movements” within the
Roman Catholic Church
The Opus Dei vision of the future, for the US and for the Catholic Church
An illustrated copy of this part of the story, published in the spring of 2006, is on-line,
courtesy of SCP, at:
http://www.scp-inc.org/publications/journals/J2902/opus2.php.
The dubious character of the Founder of Opus Dei
The pride and wrath of “Saint” Escrivá
Aside from the dubious spirit of Escrivá’s teachings, there is the question of his
character. By canonizing him, the Vatican has avowed that the Founder practiced “heroic
virtue” in his life, and that he is worthy of emulation by the faithful. Critics tell a
different story. As María del Carmen Tapia, former head of the women’s section of the
movement in Venezuela, said: “My astonishment is infinite when I hear now that
Monsignor Escrivá is in the process of beatification.” [1]

Spying on guests: According to a former Opus Dei member, Escrivá put hidden
microphones behind the pictures in the room at the movement’s Rome headquarters
where the Founder met guests. The visitors were taped without their knowledge or
consent, so that Escrivá could not “be accused of saying anything he hadn’t said.” [2]

A quest for worldly titles: In his teachings, Escrivá emphasized the importance of
humility for his followers. He claimed the donkey (a humble servant animal) as his
own mascot, and statues of donkeys are present in most Opus Dei centers. [3] In The
Way, he said, “Honors, distinctions, titles: things of air, puffs of pride, lies,
nothingness.” [4]
Nevertheless, like a garden-variety social climber, he “fought a long battle to get a
title for himself, that of marquis of Peralta.” [5] Escrivá got the honor in 1968 from
the Franco government. [6] He also collected other decorations, as well: “the Grand
Cross of St. Raymond of Peñafort, the Grand Cross of Alfonso the Wise, the Grand
Cross of Isabel the Catholic and … sundry gold medals.” [7]

Crowd management: When Escrivá traveled abroad, especially in the last few years
of his life, “great crowds were assembled, in stadia, in conference centers, always of
the faithful. He was greeted everywhere with rapturous applause. …. Many of the
gatherings were video-recorded for posterity, and questions were carefully planted in
the audience to allow the founder to give apparently spontaneous spiritual advice.” [8]

Love of luxury: As Michael Walsh reports, “everything which surrounded Escrivá de
Balaguer has to be of high quality. … Escrivá took a close personal interest in the
choice of furniture and fittings. For himself, only the best would do. … He was
constantly and fastidiously concerned with detail of decor” in Opus Dei houses. [9]

Bad temper: María del Carmen Tapia says that “Monsignor Escrivá did not have
natural good manners. He was rough, brusque, and rude. When he was angry and
had someone to reproach, he had no measure of charity in his language. … when I
went to the Vatican in 1973 and visited His Eminence Cardinal Arturo Tavera, then
prefect of the Sacred Congregation of Religious and Secular Institutes, he asked how
many years I had spent in Opus Dei, and when I told him eighteen, he commented:
‘and you needed eighteen years to realize how rude José María Escrivá is?’” [10]
Tapia heard – and was repeatedly the victim of – the Founder’s rages.
In 1953, when Escrivá heard of the death of King George VI of England and the
impending coronation of Elizabeth, he said, “Don’t speak to me about that woman! I
don’t want to hear you talk about her! She is the devil! The devil! … Understood?
Well, now you know!” [11]
Tapia had been head of the Venezuelan women’s section of Opus Dei, but in 1965
was brought back to the Rome headquarters for punishment by Escrivá; it was said
that she had “murmured against the Father’s writings” and had “diabolical pride.” [12]
Part of Tapia’s punishment was to be deprived of the right to send or receive mail.
Tapia had gotten help in doing so from a fellow numerary, Gladys. In mid-May
1966, Escrivá and his associates summoned Tapia to his office for discipline. He
said, “They tell me that you write Ana María Gibert, that woman, that wicked
woman? And that you have a post office box here in Rome. … What is this, you
great hypocrite, you deceiver, wicked woman? … And that procuress Gladys, that
sow, let her come in!” Gladys entered, got her reprimand from Escrivá, and was told,
“go to your room and don’t leave it for any reason!” After Gladys left, Escrivá told
the two female supervisors to deal with her further: “take that one … lift up her skirt,
take down her panties, and whack her on the behind until she talks. MAKE HER
TALK!” The Founder then sent Tapia out, saying “You’re a bad piece of work! …
You’re a wicked woman, sleazy, scum! That’s what you are! Now go! I don’t want
to see you!” [13]
At the end of May came Tapia’s expulsion hearing. The Founder told her, “Don’t set
your parents against us, because, if I find out that you are saying anything negative
about the Work to anybody, I José María Escrivá de Balaguer, have the world press in
your hands. … I will publicly dishonor you. Your name will appear on the front
page of every newspaper, because I will personally see to it. … You are a wicked
woman! A lost woman! Mary Magdalen was a sinner, but you? You are a seductress,
with all your immorality and indecency! … YOU HAVE A WEAKNESS FOR
BLACKS! First with one and then with the other. LEAVE MY PRIESTS ALONE!
… And don’t ask me for my blessing because I don’t intend to give it to you! …
Hear me well! WHORE! SOW!” [14]
Such was the charity of the man whom the Vatican has named a saint. When her
father wrote to Escrivá protesting the treatment that she had received, Escrivá’s aide
wrote back, with the Founder’s approval: “in view of her having lost her way, there
was no choice but to open a process, fulfilling the norms of Canon Law with
maximum justice and charity and using the utmost delicacy at every step.” [15]

Pride: In Crónica, Escrivá wrote, “In my life, I have already known several Popes,
many cardinals, a multitude of bishops. But on the other hand, Founders of Opus
Dei, there is only one!” [16]
While he lived, he had one of his followers propose – successfully – that “members of
Opus Dei should greet the President General by genuflecting with the left knee
touching the floor.” [17] The President General at the time was Escrivá, and
genuflection is a Catholic sign of reverence normally used only when facing the
Cross or the consecrated Eucharist. [18]
According to Tapia, “from the time I met him at the end of the 1940s, Monsignor
Escrivá planned his road to sainthood. Convinced he would be canonized, he had his
tomb built in the central house in Rome as if it were the most natural thing in the
world. He instructed the superiors, “But don’t leave me here for too long. Let them
take me after a while to a public church so that they will leave you alone so that you
can work.” [19] This indicates that he looked forward to being venerated, since
“moving a grave to a public church is clear evidence of a cultus or devotion.” [20]
Tapia saw that “All personal items that Monsignor Escrivá ceased to use were kept as
future relics in the central house in Rome and in the houses he visited, especially on
his last trips to Latin America.” [21]
Most seriously of all, it appears that Escrivá had a messiah complex. A former member
of Opus Dei – for a time, a close associate of Escrivá’s – said that the Founder was
“totally committed to the growth of Opus Dei because he was convinced that it
represented the salvation of the Church. It was the most crystalline, the purest form of
Christianity, and he had received it as a direct inspiration from God. There’s no doubt
about it: he saw himself as the twentieth-century reincarnation of the word ‘God.’ A
messiah, sent by God. You did what he said, you were guaranteed heaven.” [22] Escrivá
himself told his faithful, “I can assure you that you will be faithful, even though at times
you will have to suffer. Besides, I promise you heaven.” [23] In an interview with the
New York Times, Escrivá’s successor said, “We are his children. … We cannot criticize
our father.” [24] Another defender of the movement says, “Escrivá is Opus Dei in the
same sense as the gardener and the plant that have been entrusted to him form a single
unity.” [25]
Such claims were not unique to Opus Dei and its founder. In the same way that Opus Dei
members refer to Escrivá as “Our Father who is in Heaven” [26] members of the
Legionaries of Christ refer to founder Marcial Maciel as “Nuestro Padre.” [27] Taken
together, the Catholic “new ecclesial movements” appear to have a surfeit of World
Teachers, each with their own claim to glory.
A spokesman for the Legionaries of Christ makes this apologia on behalf of the cult of
personality surrounding movement founders: “In a letter to the World Congress of
Ecclesial Movements in May, 1998, Pope John Paul II defines a movement as ‘A
concrete ecclesial entity, in which primarily lay people participate, with an itinerary of
faith and Christian testimony that founds its own pedagogical method on a charism given
to the person of the founder in determined circumstances and modes.’ This definition
highlights three traits of the new movements: they are primarily lay; their work is to
evangelize; and their charism comes from their founder. The focus on the writings and
teachings of the founder, therefore, is not some sort of hero worship. … So, far from
being a sign that they are ‘cults,’ the focus on a founder’s teachings is a sign that the new
movements have received their charism, their unique vocation, in the same manner as all
the other charisms in the history of the Church: Benedictine, Dominican, Franciscan,
Jesuit, Carmelite, Salesian, etc. The gratitude and enthusiasm members feel for their
founder is only natural. They owe much to their founder’s generous response to God’s
call.” [28] The followers of Sai Baba and Sun Myung Moon couldn’t say it better.
The New Age movement, the Neo-pagans, the atheists, and secularized liberals openly
oppose Christ, or offer a substitute “Teacher” that no orthodox Christian would ever
accept. In their diverse ways, they offer a New Religion for a New Age. Opus Dei sets
forth a “gospel” that cloaks itself in traditional garb, and that appears to promote an
orthodox understanding of Christ. However, the teachings and practice of “the Founder”
and his followers point toward a clever counterfeit of the Gospel, one that would direct
mankind toward a false Christ, the “god of forces.” (Daniel 11:38, KJV)
“Sanctified” cruelty and abuse: the ethics and discernment of Opus Dei members
For any organization that claims to be holy and spiritually discerning, there is a practical
test: how moral and wise are the members of the group, in practice? It isn’t fair to ask
that members of a “holy” group all be saints, but if a movement makes very high claims
for itself, its followers should show at least above-average virtue and discernment.
By this standard, Opus Dei is not doing well. There are numerous high-profile instances
in which Opus Dei activists fail tests of morality and discernment that many rank-and-file
Christians pass.
Opus Dei’s alliances with extreme-right regimes and movements
First, there’s the matter of Opus Dei’s repeated dalliance with extreme-right dictatorships
and military human-rights violations – a consistent pattern of behavior despite Escrivá’s
insistence that Opus Dei “is bound up with no country, no government, no political party,
nor with any ideology.” [29]
Opus Dei has been strongly anti-Communist since its founding. That’s reasonable in
itself, given the religious persecution and mass murder committed by Marxist regimes.
But Opus Dei’s opposition to Marxism has led it to support right-wing dictatorships –
governments which have excused their own repression and crimes by the need to defeat
Communist subversion.
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In Spain, Opus Dei aligned itself with the dictatorial Franco government. In 1937,
Escrivá fled the region held by the Republican government (a pro-Soviet regime that
killed more than 4,000 priests and nearly 2,400 monks, and nuns). [30] He spent most
of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) in Nationalist-held areas, and returned to
Madrid with the first detachments of Franco’s forces that took the city in 1939. [31]
Escrivá directed a religious retreat for Franco in 1944. [32] The Vatican did not object
to this alliance with the regime; in 1953, Pius XII signed an agreement that gave
Franco final say over the appointment of bishops in Spain. [33] (This concordat
remained in force until Paul VI rejected it in the 1960s.) In 1969, three Opus Dei
numeraries and 12 supporters assumed cabinet posts in the Franco government – thus
holding 15 of the 18 positions. [34] Raimundo Pannikar, a prominent Opus Dei priest
from the mid-1940s till he left in the 1960s, says that the movement “set out to see if
they could take charge of the Spanish State – and nearly succeeded.” [35] The
movement’s influence in the government decreased after the 1973 assassination of
Prime Minister Luis Carrero Blanco, who had been rumored to be a member. [36]
After Franco died, the cult has continued to be influential in Spanish banking,
industry, and media.
In October 1967, Escrivá acknowledged that “Opus Dei has a real influence on the
life of Spain” with “a noticeable social impact.” [37] But in an interview with Time in
April of that same year, he had said, “it is in Spain that we have had the greatest
difficulties in making the Work take root. … The governments of countries where
Catholics are a minority have helped the educational and welfare activities founded
by Opus Dei members for more generously than the Spanish government.” [38] While
Escrivá spoke out of both sides of his mouth about Spain, Opus Dei member Calvo
Serer spoke plainly on behalf of Francoism for a Madrid newspaper in 1957:
“Freedom of conscience leads to the loss of faith, freedom of expression to
demagogy, mental confusion and pornography, and freedom of association to
anarchism and totalitarianism.” [39]
Spain has remained a stronghold for Opus Dei (and similar new Catholic movements)
since the end of the dictatorship. As Vatican journalist John Allen reported in 2003,
of the 18% of Spanish Catholics who attend Mass at least once a month, more than
40% are affiliated with Opus Dei and similar movements. [40] About 40% of
worldwide Opus Dei membership is in Spain. [41]
Note, however, the poor spiritual fruit of Franco’s confessional state (1939-1975) and
of Opus Dei in Spain. Less than one Catholic in five attends Mass, the central
religious rite for Roman Catholics, even once a month – despite canon law
requirements that Catholics attend Mass weekly. By contrast, about 45% of American
Catholics and Protestants report than they attend church weekly. [42] Additionally,
the Spanish government elected in 2004 has passed a spate of laws contrary to
traditional Christian teaching; more is to come. [43]

Regarding the Third Reich, a former associate of Escrivá’s says that the Founder told
him, “Hitler couldn’t have been such a bad guy. He couldn’t have killed six million.
It couldn’t have been more than four million.” [44] Fr. Felzmann added, “I could just
feel that Hitler was one of his heroes, and he couldn’t believe that Hitler had really
done that.” [45] Escrivá believed that World War II was a crusade against Marxism,
and “members of Opus Dei offered to volunteer for the so-called Blue Division,” to
fight the USSR on behalf of Nazi Germany. [46] Such a view of Hitler’s deeds is
strange for a devout Catholic, since the first victim of World War II was Catholic
Poland, and the Nazis killed equal numbers of Polish Catholics and Polish Jews. [47]
Additionally, it was a pact between the Nazis and the Soviets that gave Hitler the
green light to invade Poland.

In Chile, Opus Dei members and supporters favored the overthrow of Salvador
Allende, a socialist who was democratically elected as head of state in 1970. [48]
After the September 11, 1973 coup installed the Pinochet dictatorship, the new
regime quickly earned infamy for widespread use of torture. Hernán Cubillos, an
Opus Dei supporter and CIA asset, was a foreign minister for the regime. [49] Jaime
Guzmán, one of Opus Dei’s “earliest recruits” in Chile, wrote the new Pinochet
constitution, and three Opus Dei members in succession headed the national ministry
of education. [50]

In Peru, the diocese of Opus Dei Archbishop Cipriani had been the center of a brutal
civil war between the Army and the terrorist Maoist group “Shining Path.” Cipriani
“consistently defended the armed forces against charges of atrocities, and argued that
‘Most human rights organizations are just covering the tails of political movements,
almost all of them Marxist or Maoist.’” [51] Such was his justification for refusing to
allow the Catholic bishops’ human rights groups to enter his jurisdiction. [52] In
2003, after peace was restored, the Peruvian Truth and Reconciliation Commission
(TRC) paid “tribute to the role of the Churches, ‘irrespective of theological or
pastoral positions’ in ‘saving many lives and preventing many other abuses.’” [53]
However, “the report made an explicit exception of the diocese of Ayacucho under its
then archbishop, Juan Luis Cipriani, who ‘placed obstacles in the way of church
organisations working on human rights, and denied the existence of human rights
violations.’ Speaking at the Mass for the feast of St Rose of Lima on 30 August,
Cardinal Cipriani said the TRC had not bothered to talk to him, and denounced its
report as ‘prejudiced, biased and petty.’” [54]

The dictator of Argentina from 1966 to 1970, General Juan Carlos Onganía, seized
power after making a religious retreat sponsored by Opus Dei. [55] (The general
became convinced that he was “personally called” [56] to lead his country.) Under
Onganía’s regime, death squads and torture were routinely used against
opponents.[57]

In Venezuela in April 2002, there was a military coup against the leftist president
Hugo Chavez; the insurgents installed a “leading businessman,” Pedro Carmona, as
the interim president. [58] Carmona’s allies backed out when he selected all Opus Dei
members for his cabinet. As a result, the coup collapsed, and Chavez returned to
power. It seems that Carmona, himself an Opus Dei member, never learned the
political equivalent of the investing slogan: bulls can make money, bears can make
money – but hogs never make money.
George Weigel, the neoconservative author of a massive, adoring biography of John Paul
II, says in its defense that “Opus Dei members took part in the first public demonstrations
against Franco and played crucial roles in Spain’s transition to democracy” [59] after
Franco died. Other defenders of Opus Dei say that “the movement does not direct the
political views of its members, only their spiritual outlook and life.” [60] Nevertheless,
anyone’s spirituality and world view will have a decisive effect on their business and
political activities.
In 1966, Escrivá said, “I have always defended the freedom of individual consciences. I
do not understand violence; I do not consider it a proper way either to persuade or to win
over. Error is overcome by prayer, by God’s grace, and by study; never by force; always
with charity. From the first moment this is the spirit we have lived.” [61] In view of the
foregoing track record, these assurances by the Founder ring hollow.
Opus Dei’s Role in the Sex-Abuse Scandal in the Roman Catholic Church
Second, there is the Opus Dei response to the revelation of priestly sex abuse (and
hierarchical cover-up) in the Catholic Church. It’s true that activists and researchers who
investigate the scandal have found little evidence that Opus Dei members have sexually
abused children and teenagers. [62] That’s a remarkable finding – and is in contrast with
the Legionaries of Christ, a conservative Catholic “new ecclesial movement” whose
founder has been publicly accused of molesting seminarians. [63] When Bishop Kurt
Krenn of Austria became embroiled in scandal in 2004 after it was revealed that his
seminary students were hoarding child pornography and groping each other for the
camera, it was an Opus Dei bishop, Klaus Küng, whom John Paul II sent to the diocese to
clean up the mess. [64]
Nevertheless, the response of several Opus Dei spokesmen to the victims could be
summarized as “let them eat cake.” The mind-set that Opus Dei brings to Vatican policymakers would ensure the continuation of the cover-up into the indefinite future.
In August 2002, the conservative Catholic journalist Rod Dreher wrote in a column for
the Wall Street Journal that unless John Paul II took “dramatic action to restore the
church to holiness – starting with deposing this legion of bad bishops – his [the Pope’s]
criticism of modern society will ring hollow in the heart of this faithful American
Catholic.” [65] The prominent Opus Dei priest Fr. John McCloskey replied to the Journal
that a “minuscule proportion” of “Catholic priests and bishops” were implicated in the
scandal, and that “remedies are already being put into effect. I would hope that Mr.
Dreher would be more patient in terms of the remedy. The church has a pretty good track
record. Check in again in about another thousand years.” [66]
Other Opus Dei members and supporters have said likewise. In March 2002, an Italian
priest, Fr. Vimpari, relied on Escrivá’s maxims to attack “Diogenes,” a Catholic World
News columnist, for his criticism of scandal-tainted priests. The priest also blamed
parents for not teaching children to respect the Church hierarchy: “Unfortunately not all
priests live in full harmony with the Church and with their sacred commitments. One of
the prominent figures of the Church of the last century, Blessed Josemaría Escrivá,
reminds us accurately of the fact that any priest—whoever he might be—is however
always another Christ (The Way, 66). … Yes, there is a crisis in the Church in many
countries. And yes, many priests continue to contribute to it, but this should inspire us to
pray more for the priests and for their sanctification, rather than to publicly ridicule them
as a group or even under pseudonyms. After all, even more responsible for the present
crises are those parents who educate their children to all, but not Gospel values, including
the lack of respect and devotion to the hierarchical structure given to the Church by Our
Lord.” [67]
Fr. Vimpari’s Escrivá-inspired admonition is the opposite of what Christ taught. Far
from assigning privileges and “devotion to the hierarchical structure” to His apostles,
Christ called the leaders of his Church to accountability and to childlike humility. When
the apostles asked Christ, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven,” He replied,
“Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the
kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child, he is the greatest in the
kingdom of heaven. Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me; but
whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for
him to have a great millstone fastened round his neck and to be drowned in the depth of
the sea.” (Matt. 18:1-6) After another squabble among the disciples, as they vied for
position, Jesus rebuked them: “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them,
and their great men exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you; but
whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first
among you must be your slave; even as the Son of man came not to be served but to
serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Matt. 20:25-28)
In April 2002, Cardinal Julián Herranz, an Opus Dei member whom Vatican reporter
John Allen has described as “the Vatican’s attorney general,” criticized “a climate of
‘exaggeration, financial exploitation and nervousness’ in the United States. Herranz also
complained of a ‘tenacious scandalistic style’ in the American press.” [68] He denounced
requirements to report abuse allegations to civil authorities, saying: “The rapport of trust
and the secrecy of the office inherent to the relationship between the bishop and his priest
collaborators, and between priests and the faithful, must be respected. … We must
oppose efforts to impede the necessary pastoral work of priests with young children and
adolescents, or to discourage vocations or entrance into seminaries that have been
generically and unjustly defamed.” [69] In 2003, the Cardinal said, “pedophilia is only
minimally identified with the Church, touching scarcely one percent of priests.
Meanwhile for other categories of persons, the percentages are much higher.” [70]
Ratzinger, who is now Pope, said the same in December 2002. [71] Reality soon
intervened. A research report issued in early 2004 at the behest of the Catholic bishops in
the US found 4% of Catholic priests serving since 1950 in the US have been accused of
sexually molesting minors. [72]
At a March 2004 conference on “Justice and Penal Processes in the Church,” sponsored
by Santa Croce University (an Opus Dei institution in Rome), a Spanish Opus Dei priest
set out the party line: more leniency for priests accused of abuse, and more rigor against
artificial contraception and abortion. [73] Fr. Joaquín Llobell, a professor of canon law
and a member of a Vatican appeals court, criticized the U. S. Catholic bishops’ “one
strike and you’re out” policy adopted in 2002. He said that that “canon law has a bias in
favor of rehabilitation of the offender, and that it seeks proportionality between offense
and punishment – meaning that ‘one size fits all’ penalties are foreign to canonical
tradition.” Additionally, he “criticized the American Charter for the Protection of
Children and Young People for asking bishops to inform civil authorities of any
accusation against a priest, ‘perhaps without distinguishing sufficiently the origin of the
report and its credibility’.” Llobell also criticized the Vatican for “revisions to sex abuse
norms … approved by John Paul II in February 2003, which removed the statute of
limitations, allowed the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith [CDF] to defrock a
priest using non-judicial means, and prevented appeal” of a CDF decision. The Opus Dei
canon lawyer opposed recent reforms in the US and in Rome that aim to root out abusive
priests – but “wonders aloud why bishops don’t prosecute priests who tolerate birth
control in the confessional, and he applauds American Archbishop Raymond Burke’s
denial of communion to pro-choice Catholic politicians.”
For some leading Catholics – including Opus Dei members – Americans’ public outrage
at the abuse scandal heralds the beginning of a persecution of the Catholic Church and (as
a deserved consequence of persecuting the Church) the downfall of the US. In 2002,
Cardinal Oscar Rodríguez Maradiaga of Honduras, who is not a member of Opus Dei,
decried “media ‘persecution’ of the Catholic church in the United States, comparing it to
the times of Nero and Diocletian, and more recently, Stalin and Hitler.” [74] Another
non-Opus Dei cardinal, Norberto Rivera Carrera (from Mexico City) supported
Maradiaga, saying that Rodriguez “expresses well in this regard the common sentiment
of many of us, cardinals and bishops, in Latin America, in the context of what appears to
us to be a generalized and ungenerous attack on the U.S. Church. … Reviewing church
history, one can see that many persecutions started precisely with the moral
delegitimization of its members and of its hierarchy, with the aim of disqualifying the
Church and dismantling its prestige. This is what happened in the early centuries of
Christian history, with Nero for example. This is what happened in the past century with
the persecutions in Mexico, in Spain, in Nazi Germany and in communist countries. It is
this that seems to be happening today in the United States.” [75] That same year, a lay
canon lawyer associated with Opus Dei said (in response to the then-emerging abuse
scandal in Boston), “something will happen to America to protect the Church. This is
tried and true historically. … any country that has historically persecuted the Church at
the height of its power collapsed.” [76] Such is the voice of “God’s mafia” to America:
lay off the priests and bishops, or “God” will ensure that America takes a long walk off a
short pier.
Third, there is one instance that has come to light so far of sexual allegations against an
Opus Dei bishop – charges made by Alberto Jaimes Berti, a Caracas lawyer (and critic of
Opus Dei) who had been legal counsel for the Apostolic Nunciature (the Vatican
embassy) in that country. As reported in Their Kingdom Come, in 1970, “the nuncio in
Caracas received a complaint from the parents of two teenaged boys in the diocese of
Margarita, a group of islands off the Venezuelan coast. The parents were threatening
criminal action against the local bishop for molesting their sons and the nuncio feared a
scandal. He asked Berti to intervene. The Bishop of Margarita was Francisco de
Guruceaga, Opus Dei’s first vocation in Venezuela. Berti flew to La Asunción on the
Isla de Margarita and through the help of a woman prosecutor in the sexual offences
department got hold of and shredded the Guruceaga file. He then negotiated a $160,000
payment for the parents. The nuncio sent Guruceaga to London on an extended
sabbatical, where he lived a secular existence for the next three years, traveling
extensively. In 1973 the new nuncio, Monsignor Antonio del Giudice, gave Guruceaga
another chance and appointed him Bishop of La Guaira, a small diocese and port city in
the federal district of Caracas. According to Berti, Guruceaga considered himself a
mercantile prelate, licensed to make money for God’s work. One of Guruceaga’s deals
had been the 1975 sale for $2.5 million of a tract of land belonging to the diocese of La
Guaira. The money disappeared.” [77] The next nuncio asked Berti to investigate –
which was done, and the documentation went to Rome. Nothing happened thereafter; he
retained his post until 2001, when he resigned at age 73. In this Opus Dei bishop’s case,
the lust for boys seemed to go with the lust for money – and he benefited from the usual
ecclesiastical cover-up.
Unprincipled alliances: espionage for the USSR
Fourth, there is the case of Robert Philip Hanssen, a top-level FBI agent responsible for
counterintelligence in the US, who spied for the Russians from 1979 until his arrest in
February 2001. [78] He told the Soviets about four of their own intelligence staff who
were spying for the US, interfered with the investigation of a Soviet spy in the US State
Department, and gave the Communists “the plan of a program for the continuity of
government in case of a Soviet nuclear attack and planned defense and retaliation.”[79] A
biographer calls him “the most damaging spy in history.” [80] For his efforts, the KGB
(and its successor agency, the FSB) gave Hanssen $1.4 million in cash and diamonds.
While betraying his country, Hanssen was a devoted member of Opus Dei. [81] With the
Soviet money, Hanssen put his children through Opus Dei-approved private schools.
According to one report, Hanssen believed that his children “might in the future be part
of a holy war that would remerge God and country, whose leaders would then ban
abortion, divorce and other evils of the world that he and Opus Dei opposed.” [82] He
and his wife were public activists against abortion. [83] Meanwhile, he put sex stories
about his wife on the alt.sex group on the Internet, “shared pornographic photos of his
wife with his best friend, [and] secretly broadcast his sex acts over closed-circuit
television to his guest room.” [84] He also spent $80,000 of Soviet-supplied cash on a
two-year flirtation with a stripper – and justified himself by refraining from intercourse
with her, and by trying to get her to attend church. [85] When his wife confronted him in
1982 after she caught him in the basement counting out $20,000 in $100 bills, [86] she
made him confess to an Opus Dei priest – Fr. Robert Bucciarelli, the former head of Opus
Dei in the US. The priest told Hanssen to give the $20,000 that he had thus far received
to Mother Teresa’s charities. [87] The rite of penance did not cause a change in
Hanssen’s behavior; he continued to spy on the US throughout the Gorbachev era.
Hanssen and Louis Freeh (head of the FBI from 1993 to 2001) attended the same church,
[88] St. Catherine of Siena, [89] as have Justice Antonin Scalia and Sen. Rick Santorum
(R-Pa).
One way that Hanssen might have rationalized his behavior was his belief that the Soviet
Union would soon collapse. One of Hanssen’s bosses at the FBI said, “He was a
religious person who put the Soviets into a religious context. He would say that the
Soviet Union is bound to fail because it is run by communists and communists don’t have
God in their life. He said to me, ‘Without religion, man is lost.’” [90] The reporter Adrian
Havill added, “Did Hanssen believe that giving our most vital secrets to the Soviet Union
was a moot issue because they were about to collapse? If so, he was a true seer. Mikhail
Gorbachev would declare communism dead in 1991. ‘Ramon Garcia’ [the name Hanssen
used in his dealings with the KGB] went to ground a few months later.” [91]
Another reporter sees a more direct link to Vatican and Opus Dei statecraft: “It may seem
paradoxical that Hanssen would spy for the Soviet Union, a moral adversary and indeed a
satanic force in the eyes of Opus Dei. During Gorbachev’s glasnost era, however, there is
evidence of behind-the-scenes collaboration between the Vatican and Moscow. In
particular, Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Agostino Casaroli, a powerful Opus Dei
supporter, pursued a policy of reaching out toward Moscow with the aim of gaining
Poland’s release from the Warsaw Pact. … Hanssen’s most damaging activities in FBI
counterintelligence coincided with these years, 1985-89. Secrets from America’s
intelligence vaults could well have been part of the quid pro quo in the late cardinal's
dance with Moscow. Certainly, the Vatican has had no qualms about violating American
sensitivities. Indeed, it seems to reflect a Eurocentric triumphalism. The papal encyclical
on labor rights slapped rampant materialism – that is, the immoral United States – as the
‘other’ great evil afoot in the world. The Vatican’s political work with Moscow paid off
handsomely with the independence of Catholic-dominant (sic) Hungary, Czechoslovakia,
Ukraine and later, from Moscow’s nominal ally Yugoslavia, of Slovenia and Croatia. All
the while, Hanssen kept up the flow of U.S. secrets to Moscow.” [92]
Unprincipled alliances: endorsement of the Harry Potter novels
Fifth, consider the favorable Opus Dei reaction to the Harry Potter books, best-sellers
which Wiccans are exploiting in order to “mainstream” Neopaganism. At the 2005
Pantheacon witches’ convention, an annual West Coast event attended by about 1,300
Neopagans, [93] there was a class titled “A Magical Education,” whose leader said, “Until
that ticket for the Hogwarts Special comes through, this may be your best chance” to
“learn magical philosophy, theory, and practice.” [94] Another teacher offered “Real
Wizardry for the Harry Potter Generation,” and said that he “wrote his Grimoire for the
Apprentice Wizard to address the needs of a vast new generation of young people
inspired by Harry Potter.” [95]
On the same day as these two real-world gateways from fantasy “Hogwarts” magic to
real Wicca were offered, there were Pantheacon classes titled “Magick Mushroom
Cultures Around The World,” “slip of the tongue; ritual and history of oral sex magick,
from a queer sexmagick perspective,” “Divine Horsemen: A Panel on Possessory
Experience,” and a Gnostic Mass according to Aleister Crowley’s 1913 ritual. [96] Such
is the world into which some Neopagans wish to lure the hitherto-innocent fans of Harry
Potter.
Opus Dei, meanwhile, sees no problem with the Potter books. In May 2000, the
magazine Studi Cattolici (which is “closely associated” with Opus Dei) praised the Potter
books for “teaching children that good can prevail over evil;” the reviewer said that “the
books’ message is positive” and that “Harry Potter’s adventures teach young readers to
face ‘the challenges of everyday life with a look that reveals faith and passion for all that
the good life promises.’” [97] In 2003, an Australian reported to an anti-Opus Dei activist
that efforts to warn “the staff at the nearby Opus Dei school of the dangers of Harry
Potter … have had no success;” the Australian added that he “asked one of the Opus Dei
priests myself about the books, He has read them all and says there is nothing wrong
with them, it is just imagination and … they are no different from Tolkien’s books.” [98]
Opus Dei’s complaisant acceptance of the Potter books is a far cry from the insightful
warnings against them given by Catholic novelist Michael D. O’Brien. He is a Tolkien
fan who nevertheless says “Harry is the reverse image of Frodo. Rowling portrays his
victory over evil as the fruit of esoteric knowledge and power. This is Gnosticism.
Tolkien portrays Frodo’s victory over evil as the fruit of humility, obedience and courage
in a state of radical suffering. This is Christianity. Harry’s world is about pride, Frodo’s
about sacrificial love. There is, of course, plenty of courage and love in the Harry Potter
series, but it is this very mixing of truth and untruth which makes it so deceptive.” [99]
Sixth, there are allegations that Opus Dei makes unprincipled alliances with putative
enemies. As a critic wrote in 2002 to New Oxford Review, a conservative Catholic
magazine, “Opus Dei is not a conservative organization, it is a chameleon organization.
Opus Dei people are conservative when they are among conservatives, but liberal when
among liberals – whatever serves Opus Dei’s purpose of garnering influence, favorable
publicity, money and power.” [100] Javier Sainz Moreno, professor of law at Madrid
University, said, “Opus Dei distinguishes between its members and the rest of the world.
The institute is not afraid to co-operate with people of dubious reputation, outright
crooks, or even Socialist politicians. But Opus Dei’s hierarchy is careful to ensure that
these persons do not contaminate or get too close to the Work. Once they have been
used, Opus Dei washes its hands of them, casts them adrift, and despises them.” [101]
D. Ricardo de la Cierva, a Spanish historian of the movement, said, “It is a fact that, after
1950, Opus Dei university branches in certain occasions committed notable injustices; at
times in iniquitous alliances with Marxist professors and against Catholic professors;” in
the 1970s, “the key rightist group of the province of Navarra, made up by many Opus Dei
members have entered into certain alliances to form the government of Navarra ... with
socialists and communists extreme defenders of abortion.” [102] He continued, “they do
not mind allying themselves politically and/or culturally with the enemies of the Church
while, on the other hand, they frequently consider the other members of the Church as
alien or undesirable competition.” [103] An August 1996 article in a Spanish newspaper
gives some details about the strange alliance between Opus Dei and proponents of
abortion: “responsibles of the municipality of Pamplona have organized the distribution
of abortifacients ... in Pamplona. ... there was no qualified personnel and the pills were
being distributed without prescriptions nor medical supervision. ... The CDN party
governs the Pamplona City Hall by virtue of an alliance with socialists, communists ... A
large number of CDN Party members are connected with Opus Dei.” [104]
News management, financial trickery, and terrorism
Seventh, there are other public instances of questionable moral judgment by Opus Dei
members.
News management and “spin” at the Holy See – led by an Opus Dei PR Man

We can begin with Navarro-Valls’ accomplishments as a spin doctor.
Catholic journalist Sandro Magister reports, “Navarro has turned the Vatican’s grey
press office into a full-scale factory of the pope’s public image. Everything comes
second to this objective: sometimes, even the factuality of the information that he
himself provides. The most famous case of the imaginary news presented as accurate
by Navarro was the make-believe audience which John Paul II supposedly gave to the
Nobel peace prize winner Rigoberta Menchú, in Guatemala City in 1996. The
meeting never took place, but Navarro gave journalists a detailed account of it,
making it credible by quoting from the conversation the two allegedly had.” [105]
In November 1993, the Pope fell while receiving a UN delegation at the Vatican,
breaking his shoulder. Two American reporters wrote: “On orders from the
Secretariat of State, the film clip of the event, which the Vatican television crew was
covering as usual, was never shown to the press. Journalists were told that at that
moment the cameraman hadn’t been focusing on His Holiness. A freelance
photographer on the scene had his film confiscated by the Vatican staff.” [106] From
the White House to the Vatican, the same practice prevails: if some facts are
inconvenient or embarrassing, suppress them.
In December 2003, Steve McEveety (the producer of Mel Gibson’s The Passion of
the Christ) said that he had received a favorable comment about the film from John
Paul II, via his secretary Archbishop Stanslaw Dziwisz: “It is as it was.” The Papal
press secretary Navarro-Valls sent the producer an e-mail saying that he should
consider himself free to repeat the Pope’s comment “again and again and again.”
[107] Controversy arose after several journalists and news agencies had confirmed
this statement, and Gibson’s web site had used it to promote the film. In January
2004, Dziwisz denied that the Pope had told anyone his opinion of the movie, and the
Papal press secretary, Navarro-Valls, denied that he had ever sent the aforementioned
e-mail to the producer. However, reporters Rod Dreher and Peggy Noonan were both
“able to establish that the e-mail message to McEveety was sent from Navarro-Valls’
e-mail address, and relayed through a computer at the Vatican.”[108]
Navarro-Valls engaged in the type of spin that might be expected of a White House or
Enron PR man, not from someone who has been a devoted member of a strict
religious community since 1960.
Shady Business Deals
Then, there are the shady business deals that some prominent Opus Dei members have
engaged in on several continents. These aren’t evidence that Opus Dei as a movement
favored such activities, but do indicate that Opus Dei’s indoctrination of members often
fails to teach them the basics of morality.
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In Spain, a business scandal related to “the Work” erupted in 1969. Matesa, an
export firm owned by Opus Dei members, “defrauded the government of hundreds of
thousands of dollars in subsidies and loans through a fake export scheme.” [109] The
ministers of finance and trade, who had supported Matesa, were Opus Dei members.
Former Opus Dei member John Roche said that “when he was at the University of
Navarra in 1972, Opus Dei numeraries were still talking about the Matesa scandal, in
which $180 million apparently volatilized without trace into the international
monetary system, a masterpiece of financial dissimulation. Said Roche, ‘Members
could see nothing wrong in the misappropriation of the money. They thought it was
clever.’” [110]
Immediately thereafter, in Portugal, an Opus Dei numerary absconded with $225,000
that he had been given to “found an Opus Dei branch and open a subsidiary of a
Spanish bank controlled by an Opus Dei banker.” [111]
In 1983, the Rumasa conglomerate – Spain’s largest – collapsed due to massive
overspending and fictitious asset inflation on the part of José María Ruiz Mateos, who
had been an Opus Dei member since the early 1960s. [112] To prevent a banking
panic, the Spanish government expropriated the business – but the rescue cost
Spanish taxpayers $346 million. According to Lernoux, “Ruiz believed, as Opus Dei
had taught him, that his work at Rumasa was sanctified. He had followed the Opus
Dei formula scrupulously – daily attendance at Mass, the construction of a chapel in
his home, enormous donations to Opus Dei, and a large family. That his business
methods were questionable apparently never bothered him.” [113] (The donations
totaled $11 million, and a thirteen-child family was evidence that Rumasa and his
wife did not contracept.) Opus Dei dropped Mateos from its rolls in 1986 because he
“failed to attend required spiritual sessions.” [114]
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In August 2005 in the Philippines, an insurance company filed multiple charges of
swindling against its former CEO Emmanuel Ticzon, for failing to return 56 million
pesos (about $1 million in US currency) that he had (allegedly) illegally withdrawn
from the firm over the last 4 years. [115] Ticzon, an Opus Dei supernumerary, claims
that the withdrawals had been approved by the company treasurer (also an Opus Dei
member); the treasurer has said that he was “too terrified to question” the CEO about
his “off-book transactions.” A 2002 report on a scandal at a Philippine investment
bank dominated by Opus Dei members, Corporate Investments Philippines, Inc., said
that “even Opus Dei stalwarts can cook corporate books and engage in self-dealing a
la Enron and Worldcom.” [116]
Participating in the Global Arms Trade, and Excusing IRA Terrorism
In addition, some Opus Dei members have been involved in the international arms trade,
and have made excuses for terrorism.

Seamus Timoney, a mechanical engineer and Opus Dei numerary in Ireland,
“tinkered with advanced weapons systems, designing and patenting a sturdy armored
personnel carrier known as the Timoney APC.” [117] This went into production in
1978, and was sold to Argentina and Chile (both of which were military dictatorships
at the time) and to Belgium. [118]

In 1971, Michael Adams – a numerary who lived at the Opus Dei headquarters in
Dublin and was an executive at Four Courts Press, Irish publisher of Escrivá’s The
Way – wrote a letter to the editor of The Irish Press, justifying IRA terrorism. He
said, “None – let’s hope – of the guerrillas in the North enjoys killing English
soldiers, yet they will celebrate in a kind of poignant exhilaration the death of each
soldier because each death builds up the only language which the British seem to
understand. … somebody has to die, somebody has to get hurt. If the ‘hurt’ can be
achieved through civil disobedience that certainly is preferable and more ‘Christian;’
but it is difficult to believe that anything less than violence can at this stage keep the
pot boiling and so lead to fruitful negotiations. … Bombs seem to work.” [119]
To distance the movement from the deeds of its own members, Escrivá said in 1967, “A
member’s job is in no way related to his membership Consequently, neither the Work
nor any of the other members has anything to do with his professional activities. Joining
the Work only implies an obligation to seek holiness in and through one’s job and to be
more fully aware of the service to humanity that every Christian life should be.” [120] It’s
a strange disclaimer to make, since he also said, “the Work does organize religious
doctrinal training, which lasts all one’s life and leads one to … a personal and
responsible apostolic activity, devoid of any kind of fanaticism.” [121] In other words,
Opus Dei promises to give life-long spiritual training to its members – and then disavows
any responsibility for the way that they live out the “gospel” that they are taught. Nor
does Opus Dei acknowledge that its tight supervision of its members – in the
“confidence,” the “circle,” and the required confessions to movement priests – makes it
highly likely that movement leaders know what their followers are doing.
Is Opus Dei a cult?
The classic list of criteria for brainwashing and (by extension) religious cultism was put
forward by Dr. Robert J. Lifton, in his book about the “thought reform” that prisoners of
the Chinese Communists underwent during and after the Korean War. The criteria are
these:
Dr. Rober Lifton’s Eight Criteria for Identifying Cultism and Brainwashing
1. “Milieu Control. This involves the control of information and communication both
within the environment and, ultimately, within the individual, resulting in a
significant degree of isolation from society at large.
2. Mystical Manipulation. There is manipulation of experiences that appear
spontaneous but in fact were planned and orchestrated by the group or its leaders in
order to demonstrate divine authority or spiritual advancement …
3. Demand for Purity. The world is viewed as black and white and the members are
constantly exhorted to conform to the ideology of the group and strive for perfection.
The induction of guilt and/or shame is a powerful control device used here.
4. Confession. Sins, as defined by the group, are to be confessed either to a personal
monitor or publicly to the group. There is no confidentiality; members’ ‘sins,’
‘attitudes,’ and ‘faults’ are discussed and exploited by the leaders.
5. Sacred Science. The group’s doctrine or ideology is considered to be the ultimate
Truth, beyond all questioning or dispute. Truth is not to be found outside the group.
The leader, as the spokesperson for God or for all humanity, is likewise above
criticism.
6. Loading the Language. The group interprets or uses words and phrases in new
ways so that often the outside world does not understand. This jargon consists of
thought-terminating clichés, which serve to alter members’ thought processes to
conform to the group’s way of thinking.
7. Doctrine over person. Members’ personal experiences are subordinated to the
sacred science and any contrary experiences must be denied or reinterpreted to fit the
ideology of the group.
8. Dispensing of existence. The group has the prerogative to decide who has the right
to exist and who does not. This is usually not literal but means that those in the
outside world are not saved, unenlightened, unconscious and they must be converted
to the group’s ideology. If they do not join the group or are critical of the group, then
they must be rejected by the members. Thus, the outside world loses all credibility.
In conjunction, should any member leave the group, he or she must be rejected
also.”[122]
Anti-cult activists often refer to these or similar criteria in analyzing the behavior of cults,
sects, and new religious movements. Opus Dei scores “yes” on the majority of these
criteria – so it could be justly called a cult within the Catholic Church.
Defenders of Opus Dei have a various responses: (a) that the movement rarely or never
behaves in this manner, or (b) that the movement does behave in this way, but that the
practices are harmless, or (c) that the movement does behave in this way, but that the
practices are hallowed by centuries of use. Papal biographer George Weigel offers the
historical defense of Opus Dei: “The historically minded recognize that many of the
things said about Opus Dei in the twentieth century, especially the charges of being an
elitist fifth column within the Church, were said about the early Jesuits in CounterReformation Europe.” [123] This begs the question: is Opus Dei now, in truth, a Fifth
Column within the Church? If Opus Dei is a Fifth Column, it is irrelevant whether the
same charges were made against the Jesuits in the 16th and 17th Centuries.
More common yet is the appeal to authority. Catholic apologists claim that since Opus
Dei and other “new ecclesial movements” are authorized parts of the Roman Catholic
Church, and are under Papal authority, they cannot be sects or cults. Cardinal Schönbern,
a conservative, made such a defense in 1997. [124] Other Catholics, liberal and
conservative alike, say the same. Fr. Rosino Gibellini, director of Concilium (a liberal
Catholic theological journal that “exists to promote theological discussion in the spirit of
Vatican II”[125]) said in 2003: “the movements are religious organizations. They are not
sects, as above all, they refer to the authority of the Church. What is more, it could be
said that they have a direct line with the leadership of the Church.” [126]
“New ecclesial movements” proliferate in the Catholic Church
Opus Dei is not the only new religious movement within the Catholic Church with cultist
overtones. Other organizations have become prominent with the aid of new teachings
from a charismatic founder, a new organizational form, new spirituality, and zealous
recruits. These include:
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the Legionaries of Christ, founded in 1941 by Fr. Marcial Maciel, in Mexico. It has
600 priests and 2,500 seminarians. Regnum Christi, an allied movement for clergy
and laity, was founded in 1959. It has 80,000 members in 30 countries. [127]
Focolare, founded in 1943 by Chiara Lubich, in Italy. It has 87,000 members in
“more than 180 countries.” [128]
Communion and Liberation, founded in 1954 by Msgr. Luigi Guissani, in Italy. It
now has 100,000 members in 70 countries. [129] According to Vittorio Messori,
Guissani told him over a decade ago, “we are the guerrillas, the irregulars, the rockthrowers. We do our part, and sometimes really stir something up. But those people
in the Work [Opus Dei], they have the tanks: they are well armored with rubbercoated treads. Nobody has heard of them yet, but they’re here, believe me. And
we’ll be talking more and more about them, you’ll see.” [130]
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the Neocatechumenal Way, founded in 1964 by Kiko Argüello and Carmen
Hernández, in Spain. It is active in 100 countries, and claims 1 million who “adhere
to the Way.” [131]
the charismatic “cursillo” movement, founded in the 1940s in Spain, and brought to
the US in 1957 by Eduardo Bonnin.
These movements profess loyalty to the Pope and to the teachings of the Catholic
Church. A scholarly observer of new religious movements says, “Each, from its own
point of view, is promoting true spirituality, religious orthodoxy, and conservative
morality.” [132] In 2002, Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) said, “Even now we witness this
‘new evangelization’ through many ecclesial lay movements such as Opus Dei, the
Neocatechumenate, Focolare, Regnum Christi, Communion and Liberation.” [133]
Reporter Gordon Urquhart says, “If it was John Paul who gave these groups authority
through his enthusiastic backing, Cardinal Ratzinger was the architect of their permanent
place in the Church, both by justifying them theologically and by ensuring that they
received Vatican approval.” [134] In 2000, Cardinal Stafford, a conservative, hailed the
movements as “among the most beautiful fruits of the [Second Vatican] Council.” [135]
On the eve of Pentecost 2004, Pope John Paul II said, “The ecclesial movements and new
communities are a providential answer, inspired by the Holy Spirit given the present need
of new evangelization.” [136]
Upon the rock of these movements, the Catholic authorities propose to build a new
Church for the Third Millennium.
The new ecclesial movements “are in practice largely autonomous from the local
Churches.” [137] An article published in 2004 by La Civiltà Cattolica – a paper whose
contents are reviewed by the Vatican’s secretariat of state before going to press – warns
of three dangers: “The first danger: ‘The tendency to make absolute their own Christian
experience, holding it to be the only valid one, for which reason the ‘true’ Christians
would be those who are part of their own movement.’ The second: ‘The tendency to
close themselves off; that is, to follow their own pastoral plans and methods of formation
for the members of the movement, to carry out their own apostolic activities, refusing to
collaborate with other ecclesial organizations, or seeking to occupy all the territory
themselves, leaving scarce resources for the activities of other associations.’ The third:
‘The tendency to cut themselves off from the local Church, making reference in their
apostolic activity more to the methods of the movement and the directives of its leaders
than to the directives and pastoral programs of the dioceses and parishes. From this arises
the sometimes bitter tensions that can be created between the ecclesial movements and
the bishops and pastors.’” [138]
In 2003, Vatican reporter John Allen forecast the emerging structure of the Catholic
Church, based on what he learned from two Opus Dei leaders in Spain: “the parish will
not disappear, but it will play a very different role. Instead of being the center of Catholic
life, the crucible in which one’s spirituality is forged, it will function as a meeting place
for the movements. The parish would become a sort of ecclesiastical piazza, in which
adherents of the Neocatechumenate, Opus Dei, Regnum Christi, Catholic Action,
Communion and Liberation, etc., meet to share experiences, to work on joint projects,
and at least sometimes to worship together, before moving back down their different
avenues.” [139] As an Italian Catholic journalist noted in 2003, the new ecclesial
movements “refer directly to the pope as their one connection to the Church. To different
degrees they bear the distinctive features of a sect. The risk is that they will transform the
Catholic Church into a body of memberships in juxtaposed groups that don’t
communicate with each other: each movement with its own liturgy, its own discipline, its
own system of authority and beliefs.” [140] Catholic parishes and dioceses would cease to
embody the unity of the faithful. They would instead become recruiting grounds for
competing authoritarian, politicized sects.
A former member of Focolare warned, “It is ironic that the most pernicious and inhuman
idea of the twentieth century, the deification of the collective, has found its last refuge
and most passionate proponents in the very Catholics who fought communism so
fiercely.” [141] It should be a red flag that most of these “new ecclesial movements” have
spawned groups of bruised and disillusioned survivors (organizations such as the Opus
Dei Awareness Network [142] and REGAIN [143]), and that these new ecclesial
movements have a place on standard anti-cult web sites [144] – an “honor” not shared by
traditional Catholic religious orders such as Benedictines, Dominicans, and Franciscans.
As Opus Dei and the other new ecclesial movements grow, the Catholic Church is likely
to change in ways more radical than Call to Action, We Are Church, and other leftist
dissenters would have ever dreamed.
What about the good members?
Many members of Opus Dei and other authoritarian “new ecclesial movements” are – as
one defender said in 2004 – people who are “trying to be good Catholics in these difficult
times.” [145] Like Lot, they are “greatly distressed by the licentiousness of the wicked” (2
Peter 2:7). Therefore, when they see a life raft that promises to carry them unscathed
through the present ecclesiastical and social chaos, they climb on board. Criticism of
these movements – especially from the Left – only makes this life raft look more
appealing to beleaguered conservatives and traditionalists.
Despite the good will of many of its members and supporters, it is necessary to make this
criticism of Opus Dei public.

Many of Opus Dei’s adherents and allies just see what they want to see in the
movement, and will never learn of or promote the full agenda of the organization. In
this respect, they are like ordinary American Freemasons: sociable Protestant men
who attend Lodge parties, do some old-fashioned rituals, and network for business –
and who never discover, let alone approve of, the Theosophical and esoteric form of
Masonry espoused by Foster Bailey, Manly Hall, and Memphis Rite Masonry. [146]
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Sincere zealots with praiseworthy intentions can do great harm – regardless of
whether the fanatics are secular or religious, leftist or rightist.
The more convincingly a cultic spiritual movement can present itself as a model of
probity and orthodoxy, the more dangerous it is. The most dangerous spiritual
counterfeits are those that most resemble the genuine article.
The movement is using money, political power, and spiritual manipulation to re-mold
its followers and to re-make the world. People of good will may enter the rank and
file, but if they are fully re-formed in the image of Opus Dei – or if they rise within
the movement, approaching its “inner ring” [147] – how long will their sincerity and
good will last? In Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, the wizard Gandalf warned the hobbit
Frodo about the awful transformation that will befall any person who seeks to use the
Ring of Power, even for good purposes: “Yes, sooner or later – later, if he is strong or
well-meaning to begin with, but neither strength nor good purpose will last – sooner
or later the dark power will devour him.” [148]
The Opus Dei vision of the future
Opus Dei and its allies have a very optimistic (and at times, grandiose) vision of what lies
ahead for the Roman Catholic Church as an institution.
In early 2002, an Opus Dei cooperator – a canonist – made it clear how the movement
interprets Jesus’ promise to Simon Peter, made immediately after the apostle recognized
him at “the Son of the living God:” “And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will
build my church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it. I will give you the
keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven,
and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” (Matt. 16:18-19) The canonist
said that “the bills” of ecclesiastical scandal “will NEVER become due. … The Church
is incapable of self-destruction [and] I mean the visible Catholic Church, Pope, Bishops,
and all.” [149] He added that if the U.S. persecutes the Catholic Church, we face “the
collapse of America as a superpower.” [150] (Recall that several Cardinals have defined
the current legal, media, and financial reverses for the Catholic Church in the US (the
results of the uncovering of the abuse scandal) as “persecution.”)
Fr. McCloskey, the well-connected Opus Dei priest in Washington DC, has expanded
upon this apocalyptic theme. In the May 2000 Catholic World Report, he wrote a
futuristic story (from the perspective of a 77-year-old priest in 2030) in which the US had
turned left, persecuted the Church, produced “tens of thousands of martyrs and confessors
for the Faith in North America,” and then underwent “that final short but relatively
bloodless conflict that produced our Regional States of North America.” [151] As result,
there is a smaller, pure Catholic Church in which “the notion of dissent has all but
disappeared from the theological vocabulary. … the Catholics of this generation are
averaging four to five children per family. … in this year 2030 we are only 10 percent of
the population, but we have a rock-solid fulcrum of which Archimedes would be proud.
Upon that fulcrum we can transform the world.” [152]
In 2003, McCloskey made it clear that he thinks along these lines in the real world, not
just when writing fiction. In an interview with the Boston Globe, he said, “Do I think it's
possible for someone who believes in the sanctity of marriage, the sanctity of life, the
sanctity of family, over a period of time to choose to survive with people who think it's
OK to kill women and children or for – quote – homosexual couples to exist and be
recognized? No, I don’t think that’s possible. … I don’t know how it’s going to work
itself out, but I know it’s not possible, and my hope and prayer is that it does not end in
violence. But, unfortunately, in the past, these types of things have tended to end this
way. …. If American Catholics feel that’s troubling, let them. I don’t feel it’s troubling
at all. … I love the United States of America. … I would hope, rather than violence, if
there was to be a difference in the way that people look at the fundamental issues, that
they would separate peacefully rather than impose their views on the others. It’s not my
ideal. I’m just trying to explain it to you. Really, I'm being quite honest and sincere.” [153]
At the apex of a purified Catholic Church, there is to be a zealous Pope. The current
Pope – a friend of Opus Dei – has an inflated vision of the role he may play for the
Catholic Church and for humanity. On the day after his election, Benedict XVI told the
Cardinals that during “the death and the funeral of the lamented John Paul II … the entire
world looked to him with trust. To many it seemed as if that intense participation,
amplified to the confines of the planet by the social communications media, was like a
choral request for help addressed to the pope by modern humanity which, wracked by
fear and uncertainty, questions itself about the future.” [154] Ratzinger seemed to put
himself forward as the one to answer that “request for help,” by reason of his election by
God to the Papacy: “If the weight of the responsibility that now lies on my poor shoulders
is enormous, the divine power on which I can count is surely immeasurable: ‘You are
Peter and on this rock I will build my Church.’ Electing me as the Bishop of Rome, the
Lord wanted me as his Vicar, he wished me to be the ‘rock’ upon which everyone may
rest with confidence.” [155] These, indeed, are New Revelations!
Strong leaders need willing followers. In response to the priestly sex-abuse scandal and
the ongoing decay of Roman Catholic institutions – a decline that came to public view
after Vatican II, as documented in Kenneth Jones’ Index of Leading Catholic Indicators
[156] – various Catholic commentators propose strict obedience and respect for the
hierarchy as the solution. Archbishop Charles Chaput of the Archdiocese of Denver
spoke for them when – as an antidote to the “prophetic” antics of liberal dissenters in
religious orders – he proposed that we follow one of the “Rules for Thinking with the
Church” [157] offered during the Reformation by St. Ignatius of Loyola. The “Thirteenth
Rule,” cited by the Archbishop, is: “If we wish to proceed securely in all things, we must
hold fast to the following principle: What seems to me white, I will believe black if the
hierarchical Church so defines. For I must be convinced that in Christ our Lord, the
Bridegroom, and in His spouse, the Church, only one Spirit holds sway, which governs
and rules for the salvation of souls. For it is by the same Spirit and Lord who gave the
Ten Commandments that our holy mother Church is ruled and governed.” [158]
With the call to strict obedience comes the habit of secrecy, as may be required to protect
the assets and reputation of the institution. In October 2003, when John Paul II named 30
men as cardinals, the oath they all swore included this vow: “not to reveal to any one
what is confided to me in secret, nor to divulge what may bring harm or dishonor to Holy
Church.” [159]
Leaders with such attitudes are capable of doing hideous things in times of great crisis,
with the approval of their own conscience. As the Inner Party inquisitor told Winston,
the dissident in Orwell’s 1984, “Whatever the Party holds to be truth is truth. It is
impossible to see reality except by looking through the eyes of the Party.” [160]
Acceptance of this irrational mind-set (perhaps, after spiritual formation in a “new
ecclesial movement” such as Opus Dei) prepares the faithful to goose-step off a spiritual
cliff.
At the end of “The Way”
Here’s the situation, in summary:

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
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
Opus Dei is an authoritarian new religious movement in the Roman Catholic Church
that offers innovative teachings to the disoriented and spiritually hungry faithful. Its
teachings are at variance with the Gospel of Christ – even though the movement’s
leaders can quote Scripture chapter and verse.
Opus Dei’s skewed spiritual foundation has real-world results. Movement leaders
and adherents emphasize “discretion,” manipulation, and the quest for temporal
power. The bad fruit of the movement (as documented above – favoring policies that
would continue the coverup of priestly sex abuse, harboring a Soviet spy, winking at
novels that advertise Wicca to youth, media manipulation, financial skullduggery, and
the like) manifest the organization’s spirit.
Nevertheless, Opus Dei power increases in the Catholic Church. While parishes and
dioceses crumble, and ancient religious orders dwindle, this “personal prelature”
grows, and presents a united front to the churches and to the world. If there is
factionalism within Opus Dei, it is not reported outside the movement. The fact that
Opus Dei priests have very rarely been accused of molesting youth means that the
movement can tell a scandal-weary flock to seek safety and purity by following them.
The Self-Demolition of the Roman Catholic Church
A mystery remains: why have Opus Dei (and other sectarian new ecclesial movements)
grown within the Catholic Church, while other Catholic structures imploded so swiftly
after 1965?
It may be that the “powers that be” in Rome have made a decision to allow this to occur.
A conservative Catholic journalist (editor of Inside the Vatican magazine) explains: “The
20th century ended, for the Catholic Church, on October 6, 2002. It ended precisely 40
years after the opening of the Second Vatican Council in 1962. It ended on a warm, blue
autumn day with John Paul II’s canonization of Josemaría Escrivá de Balaguer, the
founder of Opus Dei, as a saint. … The essential historical purpose and effect of that
Council – as it now seems from a vantage point of 40 years – was to prepare the Church
for a new world order: the order which is now nearly upon us. … No longer would the
Church be primarily organized in small, separated communities (parishes, dioceses) of
people who lived most of their lives in one place, in one cultural context; the Church
would increasingly be organized as one world-wide community … a world-wide order,
or organism – like the new Church movements” or personal prelatures, such as Opus Dei.
[161] John Allen, Vatican correspondent for the liberal National Catholic Reporter, noted
in 2004 that the European Union has rejected any mention of the Christian heritage of
Europe in the proposed constitution. He added, “In a culture that often seems not just
indifferent, but positively hostile, to organized religion, it may be that only disciplined,
highly motivated groups operating outside traditional ecclesiastical structures will have
the capacity to evangelize and catechize.” [162]
In short, the authorities in the Catholic Church seem to have given up on the structures
that had characterized the Church for almost 2,000 years. The easiest way to move them
aside was to neglect them – and to ignore the voluminous pleas that the faithful made to
Rome after 1965 to rein in the manifest heresy and vice that spread through the Catholic
Church. In their stead, there are to be new institutions for a new, more-disciplined
Church.
After chaos, there would be a religious New Order. Bishop Swing, the Episcopalian
founder of the United Religions Initiative, would approve of the concept, if not of this
application of it. In 2004, he wrote: “In the first words of the Bible we read where the
Spirit brooded over the chaos. … Chaos is the necessary ingredient that prompts the
Creator’s Spirit to be inventive. High praise for chaos. If Creation is an ongoing
phenomenon and if chaos is a necessary ingredient beckoning to the Spirit, then we must
be living on the edge of the Spirit’s Pentecostal blast. Our world has more than enough
of chaos. Surely the Spirit cannot be far behind. A new creation must be just ahead.”
[163] He added, “Perhaps in the chaos of our own deaths and frightening uncertainties,
the Spirit will bring us to a new order, for which at present we have no language or
metaphors.” [164]
The Bible, however, testifies against any church authorities who seek a new order
through chaos. Through the prophet Isaiah, the LORD said, “For thus says the LORD, who
created the heavens (he is God!), who formed the earth and made it (he established it; he
did not create it a chaos, he formed it to be inhabited!): ‘I am the LORD, and there is no
other. I did not speak in secret, in a land of darkness; I did not say to the offspring of
Jacob, ‘Seek me in chaos.’ I the LORD speak the truth, I declare what is right.” (Is. 45:1819). [165]
Leaving aside the Machiavellian strategies of Opus Dei, we can give the last word to one
of the cult’s survivors, María del Carmen Tapia. After she was expelled from the
movement, she continued to attend church. A priest who knew her story asked her, “Why
do you go on believing in God?” She replied, “Because God has nothing to do with Opus
Dei.” [166]
Salutary warnings about Opus Dei and other cults:
“Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain.”
Psalm 127:1
“Then it came burning hot into my mind, whatever he said, and however he flattered,
when he got me home to his house he would sell me for a slave.” [167]
John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress
“The Hideous Strength confronts us and it is as in the days when Nimrod built a tower to
reach heaven.” [168]
C. S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength
Publisher:
Lee Penn, “Opus Dei & the Da Vinci Code, Part II” Journal of the Spiritual Counterfeits
Project (SCP), spring 2006, Vol. 29:4-30:1, pp. 42-68.
Footnotes:
Note: Internet citations were done from October 2001 through September 2005. Documents may have
moved to different Web pages, or may have been removed from the Web entirely, since then.
[1] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, p. 169.
[2] John Follain, City of Secrets: The Startling Truth Behind the Vatican Murders, Harper Collins, 2003, p.
105.
[3] Peggy Lernoux, People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism, Penguin Books, 1989, p. 303.
[4] Josemaría Escrivá, The Way / Furrow / The Forge, Scepter, n. d., maxim 677 from The Way, p. 167.
[5] John Follain, City of Secrets: The Startling Truth Behind the Vatican Murders, Harper Collins, 2003, p.
107.
[6] Peggy Lernoux, People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism, Penguin Books, 1989, p. 303.
[7] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, p. 14.
[8] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, p. 190.
[9] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, pp. 193-194.
[10] Maria del Carmen Tapia, Beyond the Threshold: A Life in Opus Dei, Continuum, 1997, p. 309.
[11] Maria del Carmen Tapia, Beyond the Threshold: A Life in Opus Dei, Continuum, 1997, p. 125.
[12] Maria del Carmen Tapia, Beyond the Threshold: A Life in Opus Dei, Continuum, 1997, p. 252.
[13] Maria del Carmen Tapia, Beyond the Threshold: A Life in Opus Dei, Continuum, 1997, p. 252.
[14] Maria del Carmen Tapia, Beyond the Threshold: A Life in Opus Dei, Continuum, 1997, pp. 270-271.
[15] Maria del Carmen Tapia, Beyond the Threshold: A Life in Opus Dei, Continuum, 1997, p. 288.
[16] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, p. 198.
[17] Maria del Carmen Tapia, Beyond the Threshold: A Life in Opus Dei, Continuum, 1997, p. 311.
[18] Catholic Encyclopedia, “Genuflexion,” http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06423a.htm, printed
09/26/05.
[19] Maria del Carmen Tapia, Beyond the Threshold: A Life in Opus Dei, Continuum, 1997, p. 307.
[20] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, p. 197.
[21] Maria del Carmen Tapia, Beyond the Threshold: A Life in Opus Dei, Continuum, 1997, p. 307.
[22] John Follain, City of Secrets: The Startling Truth Behind the Vatican Murders, Harper Collins, 2003,
p. 106.
[23] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, p. 184, quoting from issue 1971/1 of Crónica.
[24] Peggy Lernoux, People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism, Penguin Books, 1989, p. 306.
[25] Vittorio Messori, Opus Dei: Leadership and Vision in Today’s Catholic Church, Regnery Publishing,
1994, p. 70.
[26] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, p. 72.
[27] Jason Berry and Gerald Renner, Vows of Silence: The Abuse of Power in the Papacy of John Paul II,
2004, Free Press, p. 171.
[28] Jay Dunlap, “Are There Cults in the Catholic Church,” LegionaryFacts.org, October 2002,
http://www.legionaryfacts.org/cults.html, printed 10/24/03.
[29] Josemaría Escrivá, Conversations with Josemaría Escrivá, Scepter, 1968, p. 99.
[30] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, p. 35.
[31] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, pp. 35-37.
[32] Jason Berry and Gerald Renner, Vows of Silence: The Abuse of Power in the Papacy of John Paul II,
2004, Free Press, p. 244.
[33] Jason Berry and Gerald Renner, Vows of Silence: The Abuse of Power in the Papacy of John Paul II,
2004, Free Press, p. 168.
[34] Jonathan Kwitny, Man of the Century: The Life and Times of Pope John Paul II, Henry Holt and Co.,
1997, pp. 304, 704 (note 4 of chapter 1).
[35] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, p. 133.
[36] Library of Congress, Country Studies, Spain – Religion, http://www.countrystudies.us/spain/44.htm,
printed 07/05/05.
[37] Josemaría Escrivá, Conversations with Josemaría Escrivá, Scepter, 1968, p. 38.
[38] Josemaría Escrivá, Conversations with Josemaría Escrivá, Scepter, 1968, p. 63.
[39] Joan Estruch, Saints & Schemers: Opus Dei And Its Paradoxes, Oxford University Press, 1995, p. 190.
[40] John Allen, “The Word From Rome,” “New Movements changing Spain,” National Catholic
Reporter, May 9, 2003, http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/word/word0509.htm, viewed 06/09/04.
[41] Michael Walsh, Opus Dei, Harper San Francisco, 2004, p. 133.
[42] Kenneth C. Jones, Index of Leading Catholic Indicators: The Church Since Vatican II, Oriens
Publishing Company, 2003, p. 75.
[43] John Allen, “A New Battle Plan,” National Catholic Reporter, July 1, 2005,
http://ncronline.org/NCR_Online/archives2/2005c/070105/070105a.php, printed 06/28/05. Since the
election of the Socialist regime in the spring of 2004, the Spanish government has accepted gay marriage,
and has liberalized laws on divorce, in vitro fertilization, embryonic stem cell research, and euthanasia.
[44] John Follain, City of Secrets: The Startling Truth Behind the Vatican Murders, Harper Collins, 2003,
p. 106.
[45] John Follain, City of Secrets: The Startling Truth Behind the Vatican Murders, Harper Collins, 2003,
pp. 106-107.
[46] Joan Estruch, Saints & Schemers: Opus Dei And Its Paradoxes, Oxford University Press, 1995, p. 123.
[47] Michael Burleigh, The Third Reich: A New History, Hill and Wang, 2000, p. 416; Burleigh said that in
occupied Poland, “on average three thousand Poles died each day during the occupation, half of them
Christian Poles, half of them Jews.”
[48] Peggy Lernoux, People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism, Penguin Books, 1989, p. 318.
[49] Peggy Lernoux, People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism, Penguin Books, 1989, p. 318.
[50] Robert Hutchison, Their Kingdom Come: Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei, St. Martin’s Press,
1997, pp. 212, 214.
[51] Philip Jenkins, The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity, Oxford University Press,
2002, p. 147.
[52] World Church News, “New cardinals mirror John Paul’s papacy,” The Tablet, January 27, 2001,
http://www.thetablet.co.uk/cgi-bin/citw.cgi/past-00005, printed 06/09/04.
[53] World Church News, “The Americas,” The Tablet, September 6, 2003, http://www.thetablet.co.uk/cgibin/citw.cgi/past-00144, printed 06/09/04.
[54] World Church News, “The Americas,” The Tablet, September 6, 2003, http://www.thetablet.co.uk/cgibin/citw.cgi/past-00144, printed 06/09/04.
[55] Peggy Lernoux, Cry of the People, Penguin Books, 1982, p. 305.
[56] Peggy Lernoux, Cry of the People, Penguin Books, 1982, p. 160.
[57] Peggy Lernoux, Cry of the People, Penguin Books, 1982, p. 338.
[58] Christopher Ruddy, “What Really Happened in Venezuela,” NewsMax.com, April 18, 2002,
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2002/4/17/231158.shtml, printed 09/23/05.
[59] George Weigel, Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II, Harper Collins, 2001, p. 449.
[60] Robert Moynihan, “Josemaría’s Way,” Inside the Vatican, November 2002, p. 24.
[61] Josemaría Escrivá, Conversations with Josemaría Escrivá, Scepter, 1968, p. 73.
[62] Based on correspondence in 2005 between Lee Penn and activists associated with SNAP, LINKUP,
and Bishop Accountability.
[63] For details of these allegations, see Jason Berry and Gerald Renner, Vows of Silence: The Abuse of
Power in the Papacy of John Paul II, 2004, Free Press, pp. 209-221, 253, 290, 294-300.
[64] John Allen, “The Word From Rome,” National Catholic Reporter, July 30, 2004,
http://nationalcatholicreporter.org/word/word073004.htm, printed 09/26/05.
[65] Rod Dreher, “The Pope Has Let Us Down,” The Wall Street Journal, editorial page, August 25, 2002,
http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110002177, printed 06/08/04.
[66] Letter from Fr. McCloskey to the Wall Street Journal, as quoted in Amy Welborn’s blog, at
http://www.amywelborn.blogspot.com/2002_08_01_amywelborn_archive.html, viewed 06/08/04.
[67] Fr. Tuomo Vimpari, Letters to the Editor, “Criticizing priests,” Catholic World Report, March 2003,
http://www.catholic.net/rcc/Periodicals/Igpress/2002-03/letters.html, printed 06/09/04.
[68] John Allen, “The Word From Rome,” “A Look at the New Cardinals,” National Catholic Reporter,
October 3, 2003, http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/word/word100303.htm, viewed 06/09/04.
[69] John Allen, “Curia official blasts U.S. media coverage,” National Catholic Reporter, May 17, 2002,
http://www.natcath.com/crisis/051702e.htm, printed 09/14/05.
[70] John Allen, “Vatican official comments on Geoghan murder,” National Catholic Reporter, August 25,
2003, http://nationalcatholicreporter.org/update/bn082503.htm, viewed 06/09/03.
[71] Cardinal Ratzinger said, “I am personally convinced that the constant presence in the press of the sins
of Catholic priests, especially in the United States, is a planned campaign, as the percentage of these
offenses among priests is not higher than in other categories, and perhaps it is even lower. … Less than 1%
of priests are guilty of acts of this type. … Therefore, one comes to the conclusion that it is intentional,
manipulated, that there is a desire to discredit the Church.” (Zenit News Agency, “Cardinal Ratzinger Sees
a Media Campaign Against Church,” December 3, 2002,
http://www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=28487, printed 09/06/05.
[72] Agostino Bono, “John Jay Study Reveals Extent of Abuse Problem,” Catholic News Service,
http://www.americancatholic.org/News/ClergySexAbuse, printed 09/06/05.
[73] Information in this paragraph is from John Allen, “The Word From Rome,” National Catholic
Reporter, March 26, 2004, http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/word/word032604.htm, printed
09/06/05.
[74] John Allen, “The Word From Rome,” “Cardinal Schotte’s views on Dallas,” National Catholic
Reporter, June 14, 2002, http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/word/word0614.htm, viewed 06/09/04.
[75] John Allen, “U.S. media in anti-church plot says Mexican prelate,” National Catholic Reporter, July
19, 2002, http://www.natcath.com/crisis/071902g.htm, printed 09/24/04.
[76] From the printout of an on-line conversation between Lee Penn and an Opus Dei cooperator (and a
canon lawyer), 02/04/02.
[77] Robert Hutchison, Their Kingdom Come: Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei, St. Martin’s Press,
1997, pp. 313-314.
[78] Information in this paragraph, unless otherwise noted, is from Wikipedia, “Robert Hanssen,”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Hanssen, printed 09/08/05.
[79] Wikipedia, “Robert Hanssen,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Hanssen, printed 09/08/05.
[80] Adrian Havill, “Robert Philip Hanssen: The Spy Who Stayed Out In the Cold,” section 4, “On the
Road to Oblivion,” http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/spies/hanssen/7.html?sect=23, printed
09/08/05.
[81] In addition, his brother-in-law is an Opus Dei priest in Rome, and one of his daughters is an Opus Dei
numerary. (“Robert Philip Hanssen: The Spy Who Stayed Out In the Cold,” section 5, “Secret World of a
Spy,” http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/spies/hanssen/5.html?sect=23, printed 08/28/03.)
[82] Adrian Havill, “Robert Philip Hanssen: The Spy Who Stayed Out In the Cold,” section 5, “Secret
World of a Spy,” http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/spies/hanssen/5.html?sect=23, printed
08/28/03.
[83] Michael Walsh, “Secrets and Spies,” The Tablet, January 1, 2005, http://www.thetablet.co.uk/cgibin/register.cgi/tablet-00966, printed 09/08/05.
[84] Wikipedia, “Robert Hanssen,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Hanssen, printed 09/08/05.
[85] Adrian Havill, “Robert Philip Hanssen: The Spy Who Stayed Out In the Cold,” section 6, “Inside
Robert Hanssen’s Weird World,”
http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/spies/hanssen/6.html?sect=23, printed 09/08/05.
[86] Adrian Havill, “Robert Philip Hanssen: The Spy Who Stayed Out In the Cold,” section 4, “NYC to
Washington and Back,” http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/spies/hanssen/4.html?sect=23,
printed 09/08/05.
[87] Adrian Havill, “Robert Philip Hanssen: The Spy Who Stayed Out In the Cold,” section 4, “NYC to
Washington and Back,” http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/spies/hanssen/4.html?sect=23,
printed 09/08/05.
[88] Freeh and Opus Dei have denied repeated allegations that Freeh is an Opus Dei member. (Wikipedia,
“Robert Hanssen,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Hanssen, printed 09/08/05.)
[89] Yoichi Clark Shimatsu, “Was FBI Agent's True ‘Loyalty’ To Opus Dei?,” Pacific News Service,
March 5, 2001, http://www.pacificnews.org/jinn/stories/6.31/010305-spy.html, printed 08/28/03.
[90] Adrian Havill, “Robert Philip Hanssen: The Spy Who Stayed Out In the Cold,” section 5, “Secret
World of a Spy,” http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/spies/hanssen/5.html?sect=23, printed
08/28/03.
[91] Adrian Havill, “Robert Philip Hanssen: The Spy Who Stayed Out In the Cold,” section 5, “Secret
World of a Spy,” http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/spies/hanssen/5.html?sect=23, printed
08/28/03.
[92] Yoichi Clark Shimatsu, “Was FBI Agent's True ‘Loyalty’ To Opus Dei?,” Pacific News Service,
March 5, 2001, http://www.pacificnews.org/jinn/stories/6.31/010305-spy.html, printed 08/28/03.
[93] Attendance estimate provided 09/06/05 by a staff member from Ancient Ways, an occult bookstore in
Oakland, California that sponsors the convention.
[94] John Michael Greer, “A Magical Education,” workshop offered at Pantheacon, 3:30 p.m. Saturday,
February 19, 2005, http://ancientways.com/pantheacon/presenters/pconEvents, viewed 09/01/05.
[95] Oberon Zell-Ravenheart, “Real Wizardry for the Harry Potter Generation,” workshop offered at
Pantheacon, 7:00 p.m. Saturday, February 19, 2005,
http://ancientways.com/pantheacon/presenters/pconEvents, viewed 09/01/05.
[96] Workshops offered at Pantheacon 2005 on Saturday, February 19 – 9:00 a.m. (James Edmonds’
“Magick Mushrooms” class), 11:00 a.m. (“joi and assorted faeries” as teachers of “slip of the tongue”),
1:30 p.m. (Diana L. Paxson’s “Divine Horsemen” lecture), and 3:30 p.m. (the Gnostic Mass, as offered by
the Thelema Lodge O. T. O.); http://ancientways.com/pantheacon/presenters/pconEvents, viewed 09/01/05.
[97] “Harry Potter is great, says Catholic group,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, May 16, 2000,
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/books/pott161.shtml, printed 09/01/05.
[98] E-mail forwarded from the M+G+R Foundation to Lee Penn, 06/28/03.
[99] Michael D. O’Brien, “Harry Potter and the Paganization of Children’s Culture,” LifesiteNews.com,
http://www.lifesite.net/features/harrypotter/obrienpotter.html, printed 09/01/05.
[100] John Martin, “Leopards in the Temple: Opus Dei, Escriva, and John Paul’s Rome,” The Remnant
Newspaper, June 30, 2002, http://www.odan.org/media_leopards_in_the_temple.htm, printed 09/20/05.
[101] Robert Hutchison, Their Kingdom Come: Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei, St. Martin’s Press,
1997, p. 261.
[102] D. Ricardo de la Cierva, Las Puertas del Infierno, chapter 9, “The vexed birth of Opus Dei,”
translated by the M+G+R Foundation, http://www.mgr.org/delaCiervaTransl.html, printed 12/23/03.
[103] Ibid.
[104] Article in ABC, a Spanish newspaper, August 18, 1996, as quoted by the M+G+R Foundation,
http://www.mgr.org/sect04.html, printed 10/26/01.
[105] Sandro Magister, “The Vatican and Vaticanologists. A Very Special Kind of Journalism,”
http://www.chiesa/, June 7, 2005, http://www.chiesa.espressonline.it/dettaglio.jsp?id=32668&eng=y,
printed 06/08/05.
[106] Carl Bernstein and Marco Politi, His Holiness, Penguin Books, 1996, pp. 500-501.
[107] Philip F. Lawler, “Is It as It Was?,” Catholic World Report, March 2004, p. 28.
[108] Philip F. Lawler, “Is It as It Was?,” Catholic World Report, March 2004, p. 28.
[109] Peggy Lernoux, People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism, Penguin Books, 1989, p. 321.
[110] Robert Hutchison, Their Kingdom Come: Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei, St. Martin’s Press,
1997, pp. 11-12.
[111] Peggy Lernoux, People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism, Penguin Books, 1989, p. 321.
[112] Peggy Lernoux, People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism, Penguin Books, 1989, pp. 321322.
[113] Peggy Lernoux, People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism, Penguin Books, 1989, p. 323.
[114] Peggy Lernoux, People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism, Penguin Books, 1989, pp. 323324.
[115] Victor Agustin, “Opus Dei victims,” Philippine Daily Inquirer, August 19, 2005,
http://money.inq7.net/columns/view_columns.php?yyyy=2005&mon=08&dd=19&file=6, printed 09/23/05.
[116] Opus Dei Awareness Network, reprint of “Opus Dei Cookbook,” Inquirer News Service
(Philippines), July 21, 2002, http://www.odan.org/media_opus_dei_cookbook.htm, printed 09/23/05.
[117] Robert Hutchison, Their Kingdom Come: Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei, St. Martin’s Press,
1997, p. 169.
[118] Robert Hutchison, Their Kingdom Come: Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei, St. Martin’s Press,
1997, pp. 169-170.
[119] Robert Hutchison, Their Kingdom Come: Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei, St. Martin’s Press,
1997, pp. 170-171.
[120] Josemaría Escrivá, Conversations with Josemaría Escrivá, Scepter, 1968, p. 53.
[121] Josemaría Escrivá, Conversations with Josemaría Escrivá, Scepter, 1968, p 96.
[122] American Family Foundation, “Dr. Robert J. Lifton’s Eight Criteria for Thought Reform,”
http://www.csj.org/studyindex/studymindctr/study_mindctr_lifton.htm, printed 05/28/04. These criteria
were from Robert J. Lifton, Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of Brainwashing in
China, University of North Carolina Press, 1989, ch. 22.
[123] George Weigel, Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II, Harper Collins, 2001, p. 450.
[124] Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, “Are There Sects in the Catholic Church,” L’Osservatore Romano,
English language edition, August 13-20 1997, p. 3; on-line at the web site for the Eternal Word Television
Network, http://www.ewtn.com/library/CHRIST/ORSECTS.HTM, printed 08/03/04.
[125] Concilium English Edition, Concilium, http://www.concilium.org/english.htm, printed 08/03/04.
[126] ZENIT.org, “New Movements in Church Are Not Sects, Says Scientific Study; Researcher Thinks
Groups Are Revitalizing Ecclesial Life,” July 15, 2003,
http://www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=38882, printed 07/16/03.
[127] Tom Hoopes, “Groundswell: The Pope, the New Movements, and the Church,” Crisis Magazine,
December 2004, http://www.crisismagazine.com/december2004/hoopes.htm, printed 09/02/05.
[128] Tom Hoopes, “Groundswell: The Pope, the New Movements, and the Church,” Crisis Magazine,
December 2004, http://www.crisismagazine.com/december2004/hoopes.htm, printed 09/02/05.
[129] Tom Hoopes, “Groundswell: The Pope, the New Movements, and the Church,” Crisis Magazine,
December 2004, http://www.crisismagazine.com/december2004/hoopes.htm, printed 09/02/05.
[130] Vittorio Messori, Opus Dei: Leadership and Vision in Today’s Catholic Church, Regnery Publishing,
1994, p. 6.
[131] Roxanne King, “Neocatechumenal Way flourishing in Denver,” Denver Catholic Register, July 17,
2002, http://www.archden.org/dcr/archive/20020717/, printed 09/23/05.
[132] David V. Barrett, The New Believers: A Survey of Sects, Cults, and Alternative Religions, Cassell &
Co., 2001, p. 203.
[133] Sen. Rick Santorum, “Fishers of Men,” Catholic Online, July 12, 2002,
http://www.catholic.org/featured/headline.php?ID=30, printed 07/20/05.
[134] Gordon Urquhart, “All aboard the lean, clean, missionary machine,” London Times, May 7, 2005,
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3933-1600989_1,00.html, printed 08/25/05.
[135] ZENIT, “26,000 attend Communion and Liberation Retreat,” May 26, 2000,
http://www.zenit.org/english/archive/0005/ZE000526.html, printed 08/13/04.
[136] ZENIT, “Pope Calls New Movements a ‘Providential Answer,” May 30, 2004,
http://www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=54481, printed 05/31/04.
[137] Sandro Magister, “Church or Little Churches? The Sectarian Threat of Catholic Movements,”
L’espresso, http://www.chiesa/, http://213.92.16.98/ESW_articolo/0,2393,41797,00.html, viewed 06/09/04.
[138] Sandro Magister, “The Seven Capital Vices of the Movements, According to ‘La Civiltà Cattolica,’”
L’espresso, http://www.chiesa/, http://213.92.16.98/ESW_articolo/0,2393,42202,00.html, printed 07/16/04.
[139] John Allen, “The Word From Rome,” “New Movements changing Spain,” National Catholic
Reporter, May 9, 2003, http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/word/word0509.htm, viewed 06/09/04.
[140] Sandro Magister, “Church or Little Churches? The Sectarian Threat of Catholic Movements,”
L’espresso, http://www.chiesa/, http://213.92.16.98/ESW_articolo/0,2393,41797,00.html, viewed 06/09/04.
[141] Gordon Urquhart, The Pope’s Armada: Unlocking the Secrets of Mysterious and Powerful New Sects
in the Church, Prometheus Books, 1999, p. 413.
[142] Opus Dei Awareness Network (ODAN), “ODAN Home,” http://www.odan.org/index.htm, printed
06/08/04.
[143] Religious Groups Awareness International Network, home page, http://www.regainnetwork.org/,
printed 06/08/04. They say, “We have been able to assist many in their post legionary experience and
inform others of the dangers that the Legion of Christ and the Regnum Christi pose to the Church and those
who wish to be faithful to Her.”
[144] Opus Dei Awareness Network (ODAN), “Links,” http://www.odan.org/links.htm, printed 06/08/04;
this web page contains a list of ten anti-cult web sites.
[145] E-mail of 8/13/04 from a conservative defender of the New Ecclesial Movements in the Catholic
Church.
[146] For a discussion of the irregular, occult, Theosophical branch of Masonry, see Lee Penn, “The
Masonic Quest,” SCP Journal, Vol. 26:2-26:3, pp. 51-67.
[147] C. S. Lewis, “The Inner Ring,” in C. S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses, Macmillan,
1980 ed., pp. 93-105.
[148] J. R. R. Tolkien, “The Shadow of the Past,” in The Fellowship of the Ring, 2nd ed., Houghton Mifflin
Co., 1978, p. 56.
[149] From the printout of an on-line conversation between Lee Penn and an Opus Dei cooperator (and a
canon lawyer), 02/04/02.
[150] From the printout of an on-line conversation between Lee Penn and an Opus Dei cooperator (and a
canon lawyer), 02/04/02.
[151] Fr. C. John McCloskey, “Looking Backward,” Catholic World Report, May 2000, p. 60.
[152] Fr. C. John McCloskey, “Looking Backward,” Catholic World Report, May 2000, pp. 59-60.
[153] Charles P. Pierce, “The Crusaders,” Boston Globe, November 2, 2003,
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/magazine/articles/2003/11/02/the_crusaders/, printed 08/26/05.
[154] Benedict XVI, “You Are Peter,” first address given to the College of Cardinals, April 20, 2005, as
reprinted in Inside the Vatican, May 2005, p. 29.
[155] Benedict XVI, “You Are Peter,” first address given to the College of Cardinals, April 20, 2005, as
reprinted in Inside the Vatican, May 2005, p. 27.
[156] Kenneth C. Jones, Index of Leading Catholic Indicators: The Church Since Vatican II, Oriens
Publishing Company, 2003.
[157] Ignatius Loyola, “Rules for Thinking with the Church,” in “Readings from the Protestant and Counter
Reformations,” http://www.thecaveonline.com/APEH/reformdocument.html, printed 05/08/04; this version
lists the first 13 of Ignatius’ rules.
[158] Archbishop Charles Chaput, “Consecrated life meant to be leaven in the Church,” April 24, 2002,
Archdiocese of Denver, http://www.archden.org/archbishop/docs/4_24_02_consecrated_life.htm, printed
05/08/04. This rule is part of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola; the full set of eighteen rules
may be found on-line at http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/loyola-spirex.html, as of 05/19/04.
[159] ZENIT.org, “Cardinals’ Oath on Receiving Biretta,” October 21, 2003,
http://www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=43207, printed 09/19/05. This oath was “translated
from the Latin original by ZENIT,” a news agency associated with the Legionaries of Christ.
[160] George Orwell, 1984, New American Library edition, 1961, p. 205.
[161] Robert Moynihan, “Josemaría’s Way,” Inside the Vatican, November 2002, pp. 16-17.
[162] John Allen, “The Word From Rome,” “Pope Displeased by Europe’s rejection of Christian roots,”
National Catholic Reporter, June 25, 2004,
http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/word/word062504.htm, printed 06/26/04.
[163] Bishop William Swing, “The Holy Spirit and Two Creations, or Maybe Three,” Pacific Church
News, Summer 2004, p. 5.
[164] Ibid., p. 6.
[165] The parenthetical parts of these verses are as given in the Revised Standard Version translation.
[166] Maria del Carmen Tapia, Beyond the Threshold: A Life in Opus Dei, Continuum, 1997, pp. 284.
[167] John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress, Spire Books/Fleming H. Revell Co., 1972, ch. 5, p. 67
[168] C. S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength: A Modern Fairy-Tale for Grown-Ups, Collier Books, Macmillan
Publishing Company, 1946, p. 288.