Opus Dei

"With what a special blessing God referred to Mary from the beginning of time! Truly blessed, Mary, among all women!"

The approaching end of the year is an occasion to summarize some social initiatives that were taken in 2004. They all have in common the concern to help others that is part of St. Josemaria's legacy: "Don't be indifferent to the pain of another person. That relative, friend, colleague--even someone you don't know--is your brother" (The Furrow, 251).

A response to the The Da Vinci Code from the Prelature of Opus Dei in the United States.

"Stay with us, Lord,” John Paul II’s apostolic letter for the Eucharistic year, has been introduced at the Vatican. According to Cardinal Arinze, the Pope’s letter "will help guide the Church to celebrate this special year with the greatest possible fruits."

The Marian Shrine at Torreciudad in the Spanish Pyrenees became a family shrine on September 4 when a multitude of people from many cities in that country and several neighboring ones gathered there. The Prelate of Opus Dei presided at Mass. His entire homily can be found in an adjoining column.

On September 3, thousands of young people listened to a recorded message from the Pope at a conference of Catholic Action in Loreto, Italy. Besides emphasizing the role young people must play in building a new Europe, the Holy Father declared that “a civilization of love cannot be established by separating the Gospel from culture.”

Thousands of people joined Bishop Echevarría on September 4 at the Marian shrine of Torreciudad in the Spanish Pyrenees. He spoke to them about the family as a divine gift.

On his eighth visit to France, John Paul II has gone to Lourdes to inaugurate the 150th anniversary of the proclamation of the Immaculate Conception.

At the Angelus of July 18, the Pope said that a vacation is a good time to renew the interior life; “the most important thing in life is listening to the Word of God.”

A special year devoted to the Eucharist “is part of the pastoral plan to which I referred in my Apostolic Letter, "Novo Millennio Ineunte",” the Pope said on June 13 in St. Peter’s Square, “when I invited the faithful to ‘walk with Christ.’”