January 31st Comments (15) / RSS Post Filed under On Opus Dei, Recommended Posts

The Da Vinci Code offers a surprising array of definitions of Opus Dei. The author can’t seem to make up his mind, and in the end never manages to get it right. 1. “Vatican prelature” – the “Fact” page. 2. “Catholic sect” – same page, same sentence. One would have imagined that there might be [...]

January 30th Comments (3) / RSS Post Filed under The Da Vinci Code

It looks as though all the scholarly criticism of The Da Vinci Code has pushed Dan Brown to do a little revising. ‚ÄúAll descriptions of artwork, architecture, documents and secret rituals in this novel are accurate.‚Äù ‚Äì the ‚ÄúFACT‚Äù page of The Da Vinci Code. ‚ÄúIf you read the “FACT” page, you will see it [...]

January 29th Comments (5) / RSS Post Filed under The Da Vinci Code

In his “Acknowledgments,” Brown mentions “five members of Opus Dei (three active, two former) who recounted their stories, both positive and negative, regarding their experiences inside Opus Dei.” Well, perhaps Brown did speak to some members of Opus Dei, but they must have spoken about sports or the weather, because he seems to have learned [...]

January 27th Comments (11) / RSS Post Filed under Life of Jesus Christ, Recommended Posts, The Church, The Da Vinci Code

I trust that Pope Benedict XVI has not bothered to read The Da Vinci Code, but there are moments in this new encyclical, Deus caritas est, when it sounds as if he were writing a rebuttal to some of the nutty ideas about sex and Christianity that are thrown around in the novel. (Surely, Deus [...]

January 26th Comments (1) / RSS Post Filed under On Opus Dei

Murray Hill Place is the US headquarters of Opus Dei. Mr. Brown misidentifies the Lexington Ave. entrance as the “main” entrance, reserved, he says, for the men, and claims that the women enter around the corner on a “side street.” In truth, Murray Hill Place houses two distinct but connected facilities, each with its own [...]

January 25th Comments (7) / RSS Post Filed under On Opus Dei

Monks are members of religious orders. They ordinarily take vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. Opus Dei is not a religious order. The faithful of Opus Dei are ordinary lay Catholics and secular priests (ie., like diocesan clergy). They do not take any vows. An “Opus Dei monk” is, therefore, an ecclesiastical contradiction in terms [...]

January 24th Comments (117) / RSS Post Filed under The Church, The Da Vinci Code

The Da Vinci Code gives the impression of being hostile to Catholicism, yet Dan Brown has made the novel’s most anti-Catholic character the villain. Leigh Teabing’s hatred for the Church is, in fact, the motor that drives the whole story. He is unwilling to accept the Priory of Sion’s live-and-let-live attitude toward the Catholic Church. [...]

January 24th Comments (5) / RSS Post Filed under On Opus Dei, Recommended Posts, The Church, The Da Vinci Code

Despite its apparent hostility to Roman Catholicism, in the long run, The Da Vinci Code will, I suspect, end up doing much more good than harm, both for the Church and for Opus Dei. Of course, it is a great pity that a book of negligible literary value which seems to call into question the [...]

January 23rd Comments (2) / RSS Post Filed under On Opus Dei

World Headquarters The world headquarters of Opus Dei are, as one might expect, in Rome, in the building, Villa Tevere, where its founder St. Josemaria Escriva lived and worked from 1946 until his in 1975. (In fairness to Mr. Brown, it should be said that he does at least contradict himself on this point, since [...]

January 21st Comments (2) / RSS Post Filed under The Da Vinci Code

Opus Dei and The Da Vinci Code             I like to imagine a person, having read The Da Vinci Code, showing up at 243 Lexington Ave. in New York City, full of curiosity and eager to discover the truth. On the basis of what he’s read, he might be expecting to see, here at the men’s [...]

January 20th Comments (18) / RSS Post Filed under The Da Vinci Code

Without doubt, the most seriously misleading things in the Da Vinci Code deal with Jesus Christ and the Church, not with Opus Dei, but since many people have already pointed out The Da Vinci Code’s numerous mistakes regarding art, history, and theology, I thought that it might be useful – for the sake of completeness, [...]

January 20th Comments (225) / RSS Post Filed under John Wauck

My own story seems to connect, perhaps collide, would be the better word, with The Da Vinci Code in several ways. I am American priest of the Prelature of Opus Dei, living at the real headquarters of Opus Dei in Rome (the one that’s not in NY), which has been my home for the last [...]