Untold: Opus Dei, Ep. 1

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Hey briefing listeners, we've got a special treat for you today. Two years ago, FT journalist Antonia Cundy began investigating the controversial Catholic organization, Opus Day. The story she uncovered was not what she expected.

Because what started as an investigation into the impact Opus Day had on individuals turned into an account about how it's changing the United States. You can hear the first episode right now, just stay tuned, and find the link to the Opus Day feed in our show notes. Enjoy. Two years ago, I started investigating a group within the Catholic Church. A small but controversial one. I want to be really clear that I think that

Most of the people in this group are wonderful people. And it's really hard because I know that they had sincere intentions, even though what they did was really wrong. But I think that when you're in Opus Day, you completely lose perspective on what's appropriate, on what's ethical. And you start to understand that obedience to Opus Day is the most important thing.

Opus Day is an organization that has nearly a hundred thousand members in countries all over the world. The words Opus Day are Latin. And they mean work of God. All over the world there are priests, lay people who are married and some who are not, who are members of this beautiful family called the Work. Opus Dei, the work of God. I've spoken to dozens of people who were or still are part of Opus Day.

And a lot of them felt conflicted. I feel some anger and sadness and some manipulation. I still see there being good people in it. I guess there's a lot more distrust now. It's hard. It's really hard to know what's true sometimes. Opus Day was founded in nineteen twenty eight by a Spanish priest called Jose Maria Escriva. Escriva wanted to help ordinary people find holiness in their everyday lives.

He believed you didn't need to enter a convent or a monastery to commit yourself to Christ. You could be a lawyer, teacher, or nurse, and make that your path to salvation. Opus Day would show you how. But there are sides to Opus Day that even its members don't always see. kind of like peeling uh a corn husk. You you pull off one layer and then another and then another. As you get closer and closer in, more and more is revealed to you. But occasionally you'll

Find parts of Opus Day that you weren't really supposed to know about because you accidentally stumbled into it. So the story that begins in this episode. About what it's like to be a member of Opus Day ends up over this series being a story about how Opus Day is changing America. Its role in an ascendant conservative movement. We were the closest tabernacle to the White House. Aristocracy.

Of blood, intelligence and wealth. We want only the best, only the best for God. Officially, no. Opus Day does not get involved with politics, Opus Day does not discuss politics, Opus Day does not convey political views. Unofficially though, completely different story. This story has been hard to tease out. Because as you'll hear, it's about lines and when they're crossed, when guidance becomes control, when privacy becomes secrecy, and when spiritual belief becomes political ideology.

When the work of pleasing God becomes the work of shaping a nation. Opus Day is neither this perfect innocent thing nor this horrible terrible thing. And there's definitely room for reform, but that the reform needs to come from a real understanding and conversations with the people who've been part of it before you pass judgment. Conversations with people who've been part of it. That's what this is.

I'm going to take you through the parts of Opus Day as I uncovered them. So before we get to how it's changing a country and its culture, We're going to start with the part of Opus Day that almost no one sees. Life for those inside it. I feel like religion was weaponized against me and kind of used to keep In an unhealthy situation. I'm Antonia Cundi. From the Financial Times, this is Untold, Season 4, Opus Day. EPISODE one Whistling

The first person I need you to meet in this story is Sarah. Sarah is in her late twenties. She has corkscrew curls and inquisitive eyes. Sarah's not her real name, but it's what I'm calling her in this podcast. In the Midwest city where Sarah grew up, there's a church on almost every corner.

Sarah's parents were cradle Catholics. On Sundays, after dinner, they'd gather in the living room to pray the rosary. Sarah's father supported the family. Her mum stayed at home, raising her and her siblings. While a lot of parishes had become more modern over the past few decades, Sarah's community was traditional, old school Catholics.

Sarah doesn't really remember when she first heard of Opus Day. It was just something she'd always known. Her mum got involved years before Sarah was born, so large parts of her childhood were spent at Opus Day activities, youth clubs, and some of the things. I guess I saw it as the members successful people. High school wasn't easy for Sarah. She was sporty, but shy and quiet.

While her peers listened to Katy Perry and Lady Gargar, she preferred country singers. Real music, as she puts it. Luke Bryan and Jason Aldeen. I also felt very awkward as a high schooler, just trying to figure out Who I wanted to be and where I thought I would fit in in terms of friends and such. Sarah started high school in 2010, a couple of years after the release of the book and Hollywood blockbuster, The Da Vinci Cook.

If you've heard of Opus Day before, that's probably why. The film threw Opus Day into the spotlight, cast as a power grabbing cabal. Sarah's mum was so upset by it, she didn't even let Sarah watch it. But the Da Vincico didn't paint a very accurate picture. And the organization that Sarah had grown up in was a far cry from its Hollywood. What Opus Day was really about, the message that Sarah was drawn to, was much less dramatic.

You don't have to be a priest or a religious brother or a sister to become a saint. We can sanctify our daily life, our work, our struggles by doing our work well. Priest talk about sanctifying ordinary life, right right where you are, that any job you have can be a path to holiness. People ask me, are you happy? And I can't describe it as a joy that that knows no bounds because I know that I'm doing God's will.

Once a week, after school, Sarah would gather with her real friends, from summer camp. The girls met at the local Opus Day Center for a study club run by members. The center was in the suburbs, a large old house with a beautiful bit of land around. We'd come straight from school so we'd do homework and hang out and it was always very loud, a lot of people laughing and joking. We would eat like a family dinner together and clean up and then we would have circles.

Circle was a class about spirituality. How to be a better Christian. You know, wherever we were, we usually just kind of pull up chairs and sit on the the couch. Everyone's very quiet. Most people have a notebook out and are taking down notes.

One person, usually the numerary, she'll read from the gospel, and then at the end of the talk we would all stand up and say Hail Mary. The women who led circle were in their twenties and thirties. They were a specific type of Opus Day member, what's called a numery. Numeries commit to celibacy and living in an Opus Day center. Sarah had known the young woman at this one for years. They'd become her friends.

They listened well and I felt very comfortable being open. We would have one-on-one time. We call it mentoring. One woman in particular sometimes mentored Sarah. She's five years older than me. So when I was 16, she was twenty one. Um if it was nice outside, we'd usually go for a walk and do it on the walk, we would talk. Sarah told her everything about tiffs with her siblings.

her hopes and fears. Trying to navigate high school and trying to figure out who you are and the adult that you want to become. It was a very confusing time. You know, she seemed very wise and like she had it all together. Then one day, Sarah's mentor asked her a question. We had gone for a walk. And just kind of talking about life in general and where I would see myself in the future.

I remember her bringing up that she thought I was really enjoying the activities and I was coming very consistently. And she just said, Do you think you have a vocation to this? A vocation. In Opus Dei, that means a calling to follow its teachings, to commit to its particular path, to holiness. Following in her mentor's footsteps would mean moving into an Opus Day center, never getting married, making Opus Day her family. But it wasn't an alien idea to Sarah. She'd grown up around its members.

And even the celibate members seemed to live ordinary lives. Some of Sarah's friends, her own age, had actually already made that commitment. These girls that I had grown up with and were friends with were all of a sudden deciding that they wanted to give their life to God. It kind of made me think, what am I doing with my life? That summer, she was invited to live at an opistay centre in the countryside for three weeks.

Centres like this are a big part of Opus Day's operations in the US. They're like hotels or conference venues, offering spiritual retreats for members and other Catholics. Sarah joined the team of Opus Day women who cared for the guests. They did all the cooking, cleaning, and laundry, and looked after the chapel. She loved it.

Caring for people is something that has always come like second nature to me. I was just very drawn to how cheerful they were and how happy they were. Sarah felt like this was a sign. She'd always admired the way her mother had devoted her life to caring for her and her many siblings. Now Sarah saw a way to care for a family too, a spiritual one. And she wouldn't have to worry about choosing the right college or career.

When she got back from the center that summer, she told her parents that she felt she had a vocation to open stay. It took some time to bring Sarah's father round to the idea. He wanted her to go to college. But a few months later, when she was seventeen, Sarah was having her usual chat with her mentor at the Opa Stay House. When the time came to make a decision, things she said, do you want to? I think it was like if you're ready you can write and ask to join Opus Day.

Sarah went upstairs to a quiet room. There was paper and a pen in this little living room. She picked up the pen and addressed the letter to the father, the head of Opus Day. She asked to join his spiritual family. The founder, Escriva, had called this first step whistling, like the whistle of a kettle when it's ready to boil. Then I wrote my letter and then I just folded it up and I handed it to her and that was it.

I was very nervous, but when I finished the letter and I gave it to the director, I felt like, okay, this is what I'm supposed to do for the rest of my life. And just like a sense of peace.

That sense of peace lasted for several months. Sarah reaffirmed her commitment in a brief ceremony with an Opus Day priest, reciting Latin prayers in a chapel and bringing a crucifix to her lips. But as her high school graduation drew closer, and with it, the date she was to move into the Opus Day Center, Sarah grew nervous.

When it came to the day she was due to leave home, she felt physically sick. I didn't have a specific reason as to why I felt like I shouldn't go, but there was just something in my gut saying, don't do this. Sarah had packed up her childhood into the car, knick-knacks and photos stuffed into suitcases.

The center she was moving to was only three hours away, but she knew the distance between her old life and this new one was much greater than that. My mom drove me. And I I cried the whole way there, honestly. that I should turn around. But I didn't know how to say that to anyone. They had this big flowering tree by the front door and it was really beautiful. And I remember coming inside and then they took me to my room and the director of um that center Gave me a big hug.

said, we're so happy to have you. My mom helped me unpack all my stuff and then she gave me a big hug and said goodbye and we were both crying and then she left and that's when the loneliness really set in for me. Technically, the church rules that govern Opus Day say it takes years to become a full member. A lifelong commitment can't be made before the age of 23. Until then, the pledges are supposed to be temporary, a period of discernment.

But Sarah received a different message. What she understood was that ever since she'd whistled, her vocation was definitive. To me, it meant that once I wrote my letter that I was a member of Opus Day, and yeah, that was when the like lifelong commitment. started. But I think at 17 I couldn't grasp the concept of what that was like in actuality. A few days after Sarah arrived at the centre, the director sat her down in her office and gave her something she'd need.

A small little cloth bag, like a um a changed purse that has the little strings and you can tighten it. The bag was surprisingly heavy. Sarah pulled out two objects. One called a syllas, the other a discipline. a metal chain that you wear around your leg. Um and it has little Like little metal claws. It would leave all these indents in your skin. And when you'd sit down, it would dig into your skin. So it was very painful.

The discipline was a rope whip. The tips of the rope had all different sorts of knots on it, so it was um pretty painful to use. I would usually kneel down in front of the cross. and repeat Hail Mary's and Whip it over my back. Yeah, it never drew blood, but it was very painful. But talking to Sarah in her office, the director told her this was not a big deal. Her attitude was very nonchalant. You know, every member opistay wears the silus for an hour. Every day and it

not painful. It is uncomfortable. And yeah, that was the end of the conversation. I was definitely nervous. I went back to my room after she gave it to me and I put on the syllabus. And it was not uncomfortable. It was very painful. And I just remember thinking to myself, I don't know if I could wear this every day for an hour. These practices are called corporal mortifications.

They're ancient Christian acts, the ones that have mostly gone out of fashion. The idea is rooted in Jesus' crucifixion. When he suffered on the cross, he did so to save our souls. And Christians are called to join in this redemptive suffering. In a biography about the Opus Day founder, his followers described him whipping himself a thousand times until blood splattered the floor.

Opus Day says that no one is encouraged to emulate a screver. But Sarah says she thinks casually encouraging a teenage girl to use a cylus in the discipline at all was damaging. That it led her to think she deserved to suffer. When she first told me about this, though, Sarah didn't want me to focus on the idea of corporal mortification. That isn't the point here. What's important is that Opus Day chooses not to tell its members certain things until after they join.

There's actually a name for this wider concept within Opus Day. It's called the inclined plane. The idea is that you gradually progress to holiness, introducing new spiritual commitments when you're ready, rather than as a requirement for entry. But there's another way to look at this idea, which is that Opus Day isn't always fully transparent up front.

The centre Sarah had moved to was in the countryside, surrounded by woods and a lake. In the seventies, as Opus Day expanded into America, places like it started popping up all over. Retreat venues like Sarah's tend to be rural. In towns and cities, upmarket properties, even mansions, serve as local centres.

But they all have a similar feel. Genteel, quite formal, and comfortable. Thick carpets, heavy curtains, polished wood. Sarah's Centre was a bit like a country clubhouse, with big fireplaces and flagstone floors. For her new life, Sarah was given new clothes. A uniform, really. Because Sarah had joined Opus Day as a numery assistant. a special type of Opus De member. Numerary assistants are only women. They were described by Jose Maria as like the mom.

They take care of all the members of Opus Day by cooking, cleaning, laundry. You kind of forgot how much work you were doing because the people you were with made it fun. There is a team of women like this in most Opus Day Centers. Normally, they're overseen by a numerie, like Sarah's director. A numerary versus a numerary system. Both are celibate members of Opus Day. Numeraries. They have a job in the world. So they could be a nurse or an accountant. Whereas the numerary assistants.

Will only work in a center of opistay. Sarah had joined as a new Marie assistant because she loved to look after people. The centre held up to eighty guests at one time, so the work was intense. Twelve hours a day, seven days a week. You're on your feet. the entire time pushing, cleaning carts. And you know, your flipping mattresses and making beds and scrubbing showers on your hands and knees. It was very, very physically demanding. Sarah's work was an offering to God. Everything gleamed.

This idea is the defining aspect of Opus Day's spirituality. Its members see their daily work as a service to God, and what they do, they do incredibly well. The idea was if you're doing your work perfectly, then you can offer it as a prayer. When Sarah joined Opus Day, she committed to live by its value. When you vow to chastity, obedience, and poverty, that's something that a priest or a nun take. An opiste don't take those vows.

However, they're like deeply intertwined with Opus Day members. And just because you don't take a vow, you still follow those principles. Poverty, chastity, and obedience. These three commitments now governed Sarah's life. Obedience, first and foremost. Sarah's director ran the center to a strict timetable. I would get up at five thirty in the morning. We would have

Prayer every morning at six AM followed by Mass. The schedule is very consistent. So consistent, in fact, that it's pretty much identical in every Opus Day Center around the world. Escriva taught his followers not to leave prayer to chance. Just like physical exercise, if you wanted to stick to it, it was best to have a regular schedule. So people I spoke to in centres across the US led their lives in almost exactly the same way, and have done, for decades.

Quickly shower, make your bed, get ready, get dressed. Be downstairs by six fifteen for the prayer. This is Dan, though that's not his real name. He left Opus Day last year. You wake up at a relatively early hour, sometime between five and six. And this is Susan. Again, not her real name. She was an Opus Day numerie twenty years ago, and her routine was the same. Mass starts at 650.

Once that's done, there's breakfast. Prayer altogether or a meditation for half an hour before mass. Pray the rosary. Spiritual reading. The Angelus at noon. Your half an hour of evening prayer. Dinner was at six fifteen. And then we would go after dinner to do the visit. Just three our Father, Hail Mary, Glory B sections, and then spiritual communion. The examination of conscience.

Which is usually like at 9 30, 10 o'clock at night. It's the last thing we all do together. And then you go up to your room and get ready for bed and go to bed. It was really hard. It was very tiring. There was never really a day. You almost become just like a work machine. You're either working or you're praying. But it was rewarding too. Zara felt closer to God.

She heard him more clearly when she prayed. When I settled in, I felt like I was growing spiritually and just gaining like a lot of knowledge and wisdom. And that was something I really liked.

The second value that now shaped Sarah's life was celibacy. So to protect that, there was a strict separation between sexes. Sarah's team that did all the domestic work in the centre were always, by definition, women. But the guests who came to the conference center for spiritual retreats were sometimes men and sometimes women. With the women we had a little bit more flexibility. With the men, we were to have zero confidence. All opus day centers are strictly segregated by sex.

There are always two entrances to the One covered by hedges, fences, or a wall, so the assistant numeries can enter and exit without being seen. Inside, double locked doors keep them apart. idea also of not being seen, especially with the men, was to not be any sort of temptation. Cleaning was scheduled so men could vacate the rooms.

At dinner, contact was tightly restricted. So we would serve them, but you were not to make eye contact, you were not to talk. If they said thank you, you weren't supposed to respond at all. Gradually, aspects of her new life started to chafe at Sarah. She felt like Opus Day's spiritual guidance sometimes extended into areas it didn't need to. Because Sarah's director didn't just teach her how to work and pray, she also instructed her how to behave in the spirit of Opus Day.

Like how to sit? You weren't supposed to cross your legs. Supposed to cross your ankles. And how to eat fruit? We weren't supposed to eat fruit. Like with our hands. We had to cut everything up. How to wake up. Immediately when your alarm goes off. You get up, you kiss the floor, and you say servium, which means I will serve. How to stir your coffee. So that it doesn't make clinking noises.

How you do your hair, how you hold a fork, how you hold a knife. There were even rules about who you could be friends with. So they would say, like, we don't have any particular friendship. With each other. The only person that I go to with my problems or with questions or whatever would be the director of the center or my spiritual director. Once a week, Sarah would have a one-on-one with her spiritual director, where she shared the contents of her soul.

Soon, she learnt that her commitment to her director meant asking for permission to do almost anything. It was just a normal thing to run everything past the director. Is it okay if we go over to the other side and go to the chapel? Is it okay if I make an a dentist appointment on this day? Six months in, Sarah discovered it wasn't only the director who was watching out for rule breaking. So you could get a fraternal correction for these things. So another numer assistant could.

come over and say, Oh, I noticed you are crossing your legs, but in the spirit of modesty, it might be better not to do that. And we to always respond by being grateful for the opportunity. Before someone gave a fraternal correction, Sarah told me, they had to ask the director for approval. So, although the director didn't give these corrections, she still had a mental map of everyone's moral infractions.

One morning, as Sarah walked out of the chapel, one of the other women nervously approached her and asked her to step into the library. She said that how'd she say it? It was along the lines of If you're going to mass with damp hair, you're not taking the time to show that you love God by getting completely ready for mass. But I just don't like blow-drying my hair. The fraternal correction put Sarah on edge. It made me very uncomfortable because.

You know, in front of the numeraries, I always felt like I had to be on like my best behavior'cause I always, you know, wondered if they were gonna tell the director, you know, I did something. Among the numerary assistants, initially I felt just like More relaxed.

Okay, I need to be a little bit more on guard around everyone. While reporting this podcast, I've spent a lot of time talking to Opus Day's officials. But despite my repeated attempts, they declined to go on the record about their US operations and declined to provide a written statement. At the center, Sarah strained to be perfect, but she was caught off guard when she learnt about her commitment to the spirit of poverty.

At the end of each month, she was told to go to the director's office and hand her bank statement. She'd also give the director a handwritten list of her expenses. Hair ties, two dollars, deodorant, three dollars fifty. I was not allowed to spend my own money. If I needed to purchase every day items like shampoo or toothpaste, I had to ask the director. for cash and then I would hang on to the receipt because that would also be submitted at the end of the month to the director.

Sarah didn't spend her own money because she didn't have any. She earned the minimum wage as an assistant numery, around$1,600 a month. But she didn't keep it. Even my paycheck, I would deposit it into my bank account and I would write a check. Over to the center for the full amount. Because, as well as her work, Sarah was expected to contribute financially to Opus Day. At the end of the month, the director squared the account.

On top of like your bank statements and such, they they could see how much money you still had as well as how much you spent, so they could see any discrepancies. And I also had to leave two signed blank checks. in my checkbook where the director could come and get it if they needed it for any reason. Sarah was told she was part of a family, that the money was like a kitty for the needs of everyone living in the center. But men that I spoke to.

They seem to have it a little easier. They would say, yeah, like numeries do this. So we would ask you to do that. That's Danigan. It'd say keep some money in your account, but don't let it get too high and I tried to keep at least fifteen to twenty thousand. When I started getting more than that, I would start getting an indication.

Well, you got a lot of money in your account building up. Do you think you could make a nice big donation? One of the things the founder would always say too is like, you know, we should see ourselves as being the father of a large and poor family and let that be kind of dictating how you spend your money. Like we never got clarity as to Where that money actually went. We just had to trust the directors that it was being used. I don't know even if they knew.

Opus Day's church laws say Sarah was meant to be told about this expectation before she joined. But she, and lots of others, told me they weren't. The long hours and rigid rules at the centre started to take its toll on Sarah. A year in, she developed headaches, small ones at first that then turned into splitting migraines. So I would end up staying in bed with my shade down in silence. Cause that seemed like the only relief. Sarah knew something needed to change.

But when she went to the doctor, her spiritual director came with her. She just told me that she was gonna come with me to this doctor's appointment and I had no idea how to tell her I don't need her to come because I'm an adult and I can go to the doctor by myself. So she came and she was in the room with the doctor and I and didn't really contribute anything, but definitely listened to the whole conversation. And why did you feel like you couldn't

Say that you didn't need her there or didn't want her there. Because there was very much like authoritarian. If the director said something, you just went along with it. I didn't feel like I had the right to say no to her coming because that's just how it was. When she came back from the doctors, Sarah felt trapped. I guess just feeling extremely isolated. There was no time for life outside of being an

I definitely started feeling very controlled. Like I had no freedom, no autonomy. She started to wonder about why she had joined in the first place. Whose best interests her mentors had had in mind? I kind of felt with being a numerary system and the not being seen working behind the scenes and then just feeling used in a way to push Opus Day forward. And specifically how were you pushing Opus Day forward?

There was this philosophy that the numerary cists were pushing Opus Day forward by taking care of the members. So while there was a lot of hard work Physically, it was rewarding the sense that okay, I am doing all this work and I am very burnt out or tired. But because of this, the people attending the retreat are gonna go out into the world and do good. Sarah was one of the many women who prop up Opus Day's activities, largely unseen.

She devoted her life to this so that Operste's other members could go out into the world and do good. But so far, in what I'd heard from Sarah, it seemed like there was a dissonance between what Opus Day said and reality. It felt like some things had been intentionally withheld, and that there were unstated agendas entangled in that spiritual mission.

Ever since it was founded, speculation about Opus Day's political influence has followed. Claims that its founder, Escriva, wasn't just interested in getting closer to God, but to power. In Spain and Latin America, Opus Day runs prominent universities, schools, and charities. It's a household name. But in the past few years, the place that Opus Day has been expanding is America, where it's been opening more centers across the country. And that's having an influence on American culture.

If the environment Sarah was living in was the bedrock of Opus Day's activities, Then what sort of views was it spreading? They're not really praying. What they're doing is having group think. I do hear the work saying you're free, you're free, you're free, but then when the rubber hits the road, it feels like you're not as free. Their mission as I heard repeatedly from the priest Was to infiltrate all levels of society. That's next time, on Untold.

Opus Day is season four of Untold, a Financial Times investigative podcast. If you want to share a tip in relation to this podcast, please get in touch at antonia.kundi at ft. The reporting for this series was by me, Antonia Cundi and Persis Love. Written by me, Josh Gabbard Doyle, and Persis Love. It was produced by Josh Gabbard Doyen and Persis Love. Mixing, editing, and sound design by Breen Turner. Script editing by Matt Vella. Fact checking was by Simon Greaves.

Our executive producer is Topha Forhez, and the FT's head of audio is Cheryl Bromley. Special thanks to Nigel Hanson, Madison Marriage. Adam Schiber, Helen Warrell, Miles Johnson, Maureen Saint, and Paul Murphy. Thank you to the many sources who shared their stories with us for this series. And thanks for listening.

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