Opus pocus
Sir: As someone who is not a member of Opus Dei but whose regular confessor is, may I comment on your article 'Beating a path to sainthood', 28 September?
Unlike the gentleman from Opus Dei interviewed by your correspondent the nearest I come to wearing a cilice is when after Christmas I try to tighten my belt.
But ascetic practices have nothing to do with the hostility ranging from malicious tittle-tattle of the sort contained in your article to the almost frenzied hatred with which some attacks on Opus Dei are con-
LETTERS
ducted. Your correspondent himself, per- haps unwittingly, pinpoints the truth when he writes of some people's fear that 'the Pope shares Opus Dei's uncompromising views on matters of faith and morals'. This fear is eminently justified. The attacks on Opus Del almost always come from those who consider it a more vulnerable target than their truly intended victim, the Pope. And the reason why the Pope's enemies — a large if shadowy group liberally peppered with renegade priests, disobedient religious and dubious theologians — oppose him is because he will not permit them to conduct a second Reformation from within the Church.
As someone who became a Catholic pre- cisely because I understood that the Catholic Church alone is the authoritative custodian of the deposit of faith left by Our Lord and who has found comfort and kind- ness from Opus Dei I shall be praying for Mgr Escriva's ultimate canonisation.
Robin Harris
100 Cambridge Street, London SW1
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