‘Secretive’ Catholic organization defends image against ‘Da Vinci’

By Rebecca Saunders
The Catholic Sun

Opus Dei was hardly a household name prior to the 2003 release of “The Da Vinci Code,” a popular and controversial novel by Dan Brown.

Although the Catholic organization’s name recognition has grown due to its prominence in the novel, the negative image of Opus Dei Brown portrays is one the organization has been trying to counter ever since.

“Opus Dei is an institution within the Catholic Church that helps people come closer to God in work and their every day lives,” said Brian Finnerty, director of communications for Opus Dei in the United States.

“Opus Dei is almost like a personal trainer for the spiritual life,” he added. “Opus Dei gives people support and encouragement in seeing God in their everyday activities.”

The prelature, a status in the hierarchy of the Church that allows the organization to operate as an international diocese of sorts, is composed primarily of lay people.

Supernumeraries, members that have families and live in communities outside Opus Dei centers, make up 70 percent of the membership. Numeraries — celibate, non-religious members of the organization — live in Opus Dei centers.

Associates are also celibate members, but choose to live outside an Opus Dei center. Priests make up only two percent of the Opus Dei community internationally.

“Opus Dei is for someone who is trying to live out their faith, enjoys their work and is looking for something more than just Mass on Sundays,” Finnerty said. Members strive to attend daily Mass, spend time in quiet prayer mornings and evenings, and read the Gospel and other spiritual books every day, he said.

Jane Reckart, a mother of five from Tucson, asserted that Opus Dei has given her “the main framework around which I build my life.”

A member of Opus Dei for more than 20 years, she emphasized the encouragement the prelature provides in imitating the “hidden life of Christ,” the way Jesus lived His daily life in the years preceding His public ministry.

“He lived a family life and He worked as a carpenter,” Reckart said. “I don’t think many people are called to be preachers or healers, but all of us work and all of us have some form of family. Opus Dei can help people find Christ there, in their work and in their family.”

Until recently, many accused Opus Dei of hiding practices and beliefs from the public eye; Brown’s novel has facilitated the removal of the secrecy that formerly shrouded the organization.

“Opus Dei has had to open up a lot more than it has” in the past, said Fr. Tim Davern, judicial vicar for the Phoenix Diocese. “They’ve suddenly been giving interviews, which is probably something they should had done a long time ago to de-mystify” the prelature.

The organization has 60 centers in the United States. However, there is no center in Arizona and, as such, supernumeraries in the Phoenix and Tucson dioceses meet with other Opus Dei members about once every two months for a recollection. Fr. Matt Bloomer, an Opus Dei priest, travels from a center in California eight times a year to minister to Arizona members.

“It’s a two hour mini-retreat,” Fr. Bloomer said of the recollections. The priest preaches, hears confessions, leads adoration and benediction in the “two hour intense time with our Lord,” he said.

Corporal mortification

Although the general philosophies of living sanctification of the everyday life is one few Christians could argue with, one Opus Dei practice in particular has drawn a great deal of attention in recent years and especially in “The Da Vinci Code” — the practice of corporal mortification.

“Corporal mortification usually refers specifically to things with regard to the body. To me, fasting is a corporal mortification,” Fr. Bloomer said. “Wearing the cilice or using the discipline is also corporal mortification.”

The use of the cilice, described by Finnerty as “an uncomfortable metal chain which is worn around the thigh,” and the discipline, “a light cord one strikes themselves with,” has an exaggerated portrayal in “The Da Vinci Code,” he said.

Corporal mortification is a practice in which not all Opus Dei members partake. According to Fr. Bloomer, the majority of practitioners are the numeraries who live in Opus Dei centers.

Reckart, who has never been spiritually advised to practice corporal mortification, tries to make “many small sacrifices lived throughout the day.”

She gives the examples of the sacrifices parents make for their children everyday.

“Mortification is the same thing, but directed toward God,” she said. “[It is] something that you can do that’s a sacrifice to God that other people may not even notice that you’re doing, but it takes an effort, it’s a sacrifice.”

Fr. Bloomer suggested avoiding daydreaming and eating more of a food one dislikes than of the food one enjoys as possible mortifications.

The image Opus Dei members provide of corporal mortification is far from that of an albino monk violently whipping his back in the name of pain for God in “The Da Vinci Code.” Yet Dan Brown is not the only source providing negative press for the prelature.

Opus Dei Awareness Network is a group composed of former members of the prelature. The organization has a Web site that is printed as part of the text of “The Da Vinci Code” and shares testimonies of fallen away Opus Dei members expressing painful experiences, many of which are related to corporal mortification.

The practice of corporal mortification portrayed in “The Da Vinci Code” is, according to Finnerty, “a gross distortion and exaggeration.”

“Nobody in Opus Dei is going to do anything which is designed to cause physical injury,” he said.

Positive effects

Although the international offices of Opus Dei continue to fight the negative press propagated by Brown’s novel, Finnerty also recognizes a positive effect.

“Many people out there read ‘The Da Vinci Code’ and think they may have learned something about Church history or Opus Dei. And that’s unfortunate,” he said. “But it’s also been an opportunity for plenty of conversation and plenty of media coverage and just getting the word out in terms of the movie.”

The prelature recently wrote a letter to Sony asking the production company to include a disclaimer at the beginning of the film that would emphasize the fictional nature of “The Da Vinci Code.” Sony refuses to release information about the film.

Although Finnerty has a full time job managing the press created by “The Da Vinci Code,” Reckart has hardly noticed effects of the novel on her life.

“I wouldn’t say that it has really affected my life. I think the worst thing about it is that it has really distorted Catholicism, distorted Christianity, distorted the reality of Christ’s life,” she said. “On the other hand, many people that know I’m in Opus Dei come to see me… and that’s been really neat.”