It's not a sect....it's an organization largely considered secret about much is written but much less is known... Here is a review of a book entitled..it's my understanding the members are very successful intellectual people..Lou Gerstner, former CEO of IBM, is strongly rumored to be a member.
"Opus Dei: An Objective Look Behind the Myths and Reality of the Most Controversial Force in the Catholic Church"
"I'd like to comment on this book, rather than outside impressions as other reviewers have about their experiences with Opus Dei. While I understand people have strong inclinations that they bring to the reading of this book, commenting on the book itself is, after all, the point of this part of the site.
John Allen writes exhaustively and cogently about this particular group, shrouded in some mystery and misrepresentation. He digs deeply into their origins as well as purpose--a purpose that is not new, but seems absolutely timeless. Crucially, he writes not just of Opus Dei's distinct, and, to some, often overly intense spirituality, but also all their other corporate, charitable and educational works where such spirituality, seen as threatening in some quarters, is neither particularly present nor hardly harmful.
Allen doesn't seem to leave any major contraversial stones unturned: secrecy, mortification, women, recruitment, Vatican influence, politics and obedience. In terms of picking through dirty laundry, it seems difficult to ask Allen to go much further. Particular sensitivity was given to the experiences of disgruntled former members but I was a little disappointed that there wasn't a bit more depth there. Discussion of the clear steps typically taken, both by spiritual directors and friends at a particular center and the prospective member, to "whistle", clearly consequential moments presumably for the good for a current member and presumably for ill for an ex-member, would have been helpful to be more clearly expanded and developed. I believe if Allen had tackled this more head on, he would have given due justice to both the experience of embittered ex-members and shown light on how the organization has gone about, and should go about in the future, these critical phases.
Transparency, Allen asserts, would help both Opus Dei's image and its mission. It is simple, powerful advice but it can be taken a little too simply in its application. In order for a person to know and understand a vocation to Opus Dei, it's absurd and self-defeating for a person to know all the pieties, roles and responsibilities for a vocation, right away. Perhaps the aim of Opus Dei's detractors is precisely that. Also, given the increasing prejudicies out there of not just Opus Dei but of traditional forms of Catholic prayer and practice more broadly, a certain hesitancy is very understandable, particularly given the prelature's committed secularity "in the world" living and working amongst everyone else. As Allen begins to imply, there are some corners that simply have an intellectual problem with laypeople, free of religious dress or habit, living a regimented spirituality in a way that could be kept private from public view. Still, in his points in favor of transparency, Allen is in principle suggesting a balance that Opus Dei, to be successful, must strike.
In researching the views and experiences of disgruntled ex-members, Allen recognizes, quite rightly in my view, that in the extreme contrast of experiences between those who left Opus Dei on bad terms, those who left on good terms, and those who still belong, that it simply can't be that one of these sides is telling the truth and the others are lying. Rather, the case is most likely that each of these groups experienced similar events, tribulations, growing pains and pressures but interpreted and internalized them through very different prisms. This is a clear, balanced distinction, generally not present in most writing about Opus Dei. One gets the sense that if one decides to become a member of Opus Dei, despite its seeming intense demands and rigidity, it requires the person to be rather personally independent in pursuit of that, in the wider world and within Opus Dei's make up and organizational culture.
The "7 Sins of Opus Dei" as suggested for improvement by a current (not former) numerary that are in the final pages are worth meditating on for those in, close to and outside Opus Dei.
This book ought be the new standard by which Opus Dei is now viewed. |
