505. February 14, Women's Section, Priestly Society of Holy Cross (II)

Meditations no. 435 (unofficial computer-aided translation)

Foundation of the Priestly Society of the Holy Cross

Our Lord has entrusted us with a divine message, which we should pass on to each and every soul on this earth…

To each one of them we must say: amice, ascende superius (Luke 14: 10), aspire to participate in the banquet, do not forget your dignity; look to Christ whom you ought to imitate, who says to all souls: ecce prandium meum paravi, my banquet is prepared; venite ad nuptias (Matt22: 4), come to the wedding.

All of us in the Work collaborate in the task God has set for Opus Dei, which has this particular function chosen for it within the general aim of the Church. Every one of the faithful in the Prelature strives to be an apostle in their particular environment; by our example and by our conversation, we bring to Christ those persons who live or work next to us. But in our apostolate, in leading souls along the paths of interior life, we come up against the sacramental wall. The sanctifying role of the layman would be incomplete without the sanctifying role of the priest, who administers the sacrament of penance, celebrates the Eucharist and proclaims the word of God in the name of the Church.

In the first years of our apostolates, our Father wrote, I accepted the help of a few priests who wanted to bind themselves to Opus Dei in some way. But God soon made it clear to me that, although they were good people, excellent some of them, they were not the ones called to fulfil the mission which I outlined above. For this reason, in an earlier document, I determined that for some time (I would say until when), these priests should limit themselves to the administration of the sacraments and strictly ecclesiastical functions.

Nevertheless, since these priests could not really understand what the Lord was asking of us, especially in relation to the apostolates of the women’s section - two or three of them were like my ‘crown of thorns’, because they disoriented people and sowed confusion - soon I had to do without their help. From then on, I would call some priests, who were not in any way connected to the Work, to hear the confessions of people in the Work, and to celebrate the liturgical ceremonies. This I did until we were able to find an appropriate solution to this fundamental necessity.

This was a difficult problem since none of the titles of ordination foreseen in the Code of Canon Law at that time was adaptable to the necessities and the spirit of the Work. For many years, our Father prayed, and asked others to pray, for this intention; he studied the topic thoroughly, and sought the advice of many people who were very competent in this field. However, none of the solutions proposed to him fitted in with what our Lord wanted. It was then, as on other occasions in the Work’s history, that God intervened, giving precise indications.

On the 14th of February 1943, after having sought and not found the juridical solution, our Lord wished to give it to me, clearly and precisely. When I had finished celebrating the holy Mass in a Centre of the women’s section. I drew our seal, Christ’s cross inscribed within the heart of the world, and I was able to speak of the Priestly Society of the Holy Cross.

Imagine my joy when I saw the solution to the problem of how my priest sons, who were so sorely needed, could dedicate themselves fully to the Work’s apostolates. And afterwards, how great was my joy and my thanksgiving when all diocesan priests - whom I loved so much, for their vocation is also mine and yours - were able to belong to our Family.

Priests and laity form a single class in the Work.

The calling to the priesthood does not represent a change in our vocation. The members of Opus Dei who are not priests do not form a separate category; in the Work everyone, laity and priests, form a single class. All live the same spirit and receive the same formation. All have a truly priestly soul and a completely lay outlook.

It is the first time in the history of the Church that his has happened, our founder wrote. And it is another of the many wonderful phenomena of our life that our particular law has crystallised. Opus Dei has created many canonical and theological problems in the Church and has solved them. I say this with humility, for humility is truth. Once solved, the problems appeared simple. Among them, there is this one, that even though there are clerics and laity, there could be only one class. In other institutions priests form the aristocracy. In the Work we are all the same.

The priest and the lay person are both obliged to strive for sanctity, which is a participation in divine life. This is a requirement of their common Christian vocation. It is something that stems from the one baptism that both have received. The lay person is not a second-class Christian. Sanctity, whether in the priest or in the lay person, is nothing but the perfection of the Christian life, living our divine filiation to the full. In the eyes of our Father God, we are all children of equal condition. Whatever may be the service or the ministry assigned to each of us: little children all, for whom - precisely because of their littleness - the kingdom of heaven has been reserved.

Together with the lay outlook which is appropriate to our condition in the world, all of us have a priestly soul. The divine calling that brought us to the Work demands that all of us, the lay people included, practise certain virtues that any good priest has to live. We must all live, for instance, charity, zeal for souls, a spirit of penance, humility and a complete self-giving. God asks all of us to have in our hearts the same sentiments Christ had in his (cf Phil2: 5)… All of us, priests and lay people, are given both the chance and the duty to be contemplative souls in all circumstances - in the midst of the world, too - and to identify ourselves with Christ (cf Gal 4: 19). Thus we will follow our Lord, we will put on the person of Christ (cf Gal 3: 27) and we will live his life, being able to say with the Apostle: vivo autem, iam non ego: vivit vero in me Christus (Gal2: 20). And then each one of us, as a good Christian, is no longer just alter Christus, but ipse Christus.

Gratitude to the Lord for the priests of the Work.

Nothing forms a barrier between the priests and the lay people in the Work. My children, we have made it impossible to erect walls of separation among ourselves. The members of Opus Dei who are called to the priesthood still belong to a single class with the lay people in the Work. This is due to God’s very special providence, and we ought to be grateful to him from the depths of our heart.

In the meantime, under the impulse of God’s grace, the Work has been growing and spreading to all sectors. We have gone on to develop many apostolates, corporate apostolates as well. There have also been abundant vocations from different races throughout the world. My dreams have become a very tangible, worldwide reality. The Work has grown in intensity of formation and in extension. She has not heeded frontiers or languages or races. She does not discriminate. She serves for the good of all souls in the service of God’s holy Church. Our Father asked us to pray that there always be priests in Opus Dei to attend to the apostolates and to give Christ’s light to all the men and women who await us. These priests must be ready to inform our personal life and our whole apostolic work with their spirit. We need priests with our spirit who are well prepared, cheerful, active and effective; who have a sportsmanlike outlook on life; who willingly sacrifice themselves for their brothers and sisters without any victim complex; who know that everyone in the Work loves them with all their soul. My children, pray a great deal that they be cheerful and very holy; that they not think about themselves but only about the glory of God and the good of the others.

Pray that Opus Dei never lack the priests we need, our Father frequently told us, priests who will be faithful and be very busy. Pray a great deal. Pray in laetitia. We must bring this desire into our prayer. And we must not forget that the Lord our God wants us to ask his help, so that our desire become a reality: Petite et dabitur vobis; quaerite, et invenietis; pulsate, et aperitur vobis (Matt 7: 7; Luke 11: 9). Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. I ask for priests. I call priests. I seek priests made to the measure of Christ’s Heart, that is, with the spirit of Opus Dei, who will willingly serve all souls, especially their brothers and sisters. We need them because God is giving us many vocations.

A concrete proof of our gratitude to God for having priests in the Work will be the efforts we make to bring many of our friends to the priests of the Work for spiritual guidance. This is the great work that belongs to us all. The mission of the lay people, my sons and daughters, is to load their brothers who are priests with work, and consequently with joy, by bringing many people to take advantage of their ministry.

We can pause for a moment now before God to ask ourselves, “Am I concerned with bringing my friends to the means of formation? Am I trying each day to bring some souls to the priest?”

The Virgin Mary watches over us. She will bring even greater fruit to the apostolic life of all her children in the Work, lay and priests, each one trying to have an impact on souls in his or her own state in life and situation.