When St. Josemaría Escrivá was ordained a priest on 28 March 1925, he was just 23 years old. Nine years later, he published The Way. Today, on the anniversary of that ordination, we are happy to introduce The Way in illustrations, a creative and evangelising project from the Opus Dei Office of Communication in Barcelona.
At the heart of the project is The Way, the most widely read work by the founder of Opus Dei, first published in 1934. According to research by the Cervantes Institute, it was the most translated work of non-fiction originally written in Spanish between 1950 and 2021. Its 999 short reflections on Christian life, character formation, and the search for God in everyday moments now serve as the starting point for a fresh way of praying with the book.
100 of those short reflections were chosen for this project, and they are being released as illustrated posts on Instagram at @caminosje. From 19 March on, two new images have appeared each week, together with a reflection, in English, Spanish, and Catalan. The project will run for a full year, concluding on the Feast of St. Joseph in 2027.
The illustrator behind the project is Santiago María López, known professionally as Samlo. Born in Argentina and now based in Barcelona, he is among the most respected Catholic illustrators working in the digital world today. He has collaborated with organisations of the stature of Marvel, Disney, and Apple, and his distinctive style has earned him a loyal international following. Now, he is putting that talent to work in service of something far greater.
The challenge was twofold: to select 100 reflections from the book’s 999, and to find the right visual language for each. Samlo gravitated towards those with the strongest potential to be translated into image (“Each point challenges you in a different way,” he told El Debate), and took on the challenge of rendering “a text of such depth into a vocabulary that is simple, direct, and attuned to the way we engage with content today.”
The process has also been a journey of the spirit. Samlo found a deep and practical guide in the pages of The Way, one that feeds a life of prayer and inspires a daily examination of conscience.
The past year was a particularly fruitful one for The Way: Rialp just published a special edition in honour of its 100th edition in Spanish, with a prologue from the prelate of Opus Dei, Msgr. Fernando Ocáriz. The full text is available in 28 languages free of charge on escriva.org.
The project’s motto summarizes its spirit: “A pocket map for anyone searching for God.” The illustrations are not meant to replace reading the book: they are an invitation to discover or rediscover it. It forms part of the preparation for the centenary of Opus Dei, and it is born of the conviction that St. Josemaría’s message has much to say to people today, and can be encountered between study sessions, on the way to work, or in the quiet minutes between meetings.
The project translates a Christian spiritual classic into a new language. “The real impact,” Samlo says, “will come from each person who finds these illustrations as part of their own way.”