Opus Dei

On the eighth centenary of St. Francis of Assisi's death, Friar Francesco Ielpo, Custos of the Holy Land, looks at what the St. Francis' poverty and St. Josemaría's teaching on detachment have in common.

Opus Dei was born on October 2, 1928, while St. Josemaría was making a retreat at the Vincentian Fathers' house in Madrid: St. Vincent de Paul had a great impact on St. Josemaría from his childhood to the very day he saw Opus Dei. As the Work journeys toward its first centenary, we look back on these encounters as one more reason to give thanks for the saints who have walked alongside it in history.

Across four episodes, more than forty people from ten countries open up about how experiencing God's love in daily life has helped them find strength in their own fragility. It's a journey from Brazil to South Korea that takes us into true stories full of challenges, yes, but also of faith and hope.

Raphaël is 23. He was baptised this Easter, and in a few days' time he'll see the Pope for the first time, in his native France.

Today Pope Leo XIV turns 71. In just a few days he will travel to France (Paris, Lourdes, and Metz, from 25-28 September) and many people are already preparing to welcome him. A group of friends got a head start in their own way, through his texts.

Director Jumpei Matsumoto and Bishop Toshihiro Sakai discuss forgiveness, friendship with God, and how an actor's craft can be a path to becoming "another Christ."

Why read the Pope? A practical guide to reading papal texts and turning them into prayer.

We bring this series to a close with an invitation to the beauty of the everyday: to discover how the objects we use in daily life resonate with our interior life, to the use of "human devices" that rouse the heart when it grows distracted, and to discovering the importance of form in shaping our world in a more Christian, and therefore more beautiful, way.

Isidoro Zorzano was born on 13 September 1902, and was declared venerable ten years ago. He was an engineer, a friend of St. Josemaría, and one of the first members of Opus Dei. In the midst of the Spanish Civil War, though he could have found safety, he stayed in Madrid so as not to leave his own people alone. His story is a reminder that difficulties, lived with God, do not break a family apart: they help it grow.